


I See the Boys of Summer

by timedoesntexist



Series: In the Summer [1]
Category: BLACKPINK (Band), 방탄소년단 | Bangtan Boys | BTS
Genre: (like one sentence its not extreme at all), Alcohol, Alternate Universe - Summer Camp, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Growing Up Together, Happy Ending, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Jeon Jungkook & Kim Taehyung | V Are Best Friends, Jeon Jungkook Is Bad at Feelings, Kim Taehyung | V Is a Sweetheart, Lisa is a Gay Icon fight me on it, M/M, Misunderstandings, Slow Burn, gratuitous pretentious literature shit, lisa and jungkook are bros, lisoo if you look at it through the hubble telescope, yoonseok if you squint through a microscope
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-02
Updated: 2018-07-02
Packaged: 2019-06-01 12:04:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 22,283
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15142703
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/timedoesntexist/pseuds/timedoesntexist
Summary: Jungkook learns to fall in love with long-legged, honey-skinned, bright-eyed summers and the way the laughter of the sun seems to sing off the lake.Taehyung falls in love with Jungkook the way that the sun sets at the end of the last summer night; slowly, softly, and then all too quickly.





	I See the Boys of Summer

**Author's Note:**

> ayy so whenever i get major writer's block i work on this one-shot idea i've had for awhile and it's finally done! yay! (side note: thanks to my beta @strawberrriesandcigarettes for putting up with my many, many spelling errors). It was supposed to be 15k max but . . . oops
> 
> title comes from a Dylan Thomas poem and i hope u like poetry cause the tags do not lie there is so much pretentious literature shit in here 
> 
> Thanks for reading!! <3 <3

☼☼☼

"In the summer

I stretch out on the shore

Had I told the sea

What I felt for you 

Its shells 

And fish 

Would have followed me "

_ Nizar Qabbani  _

☼☼☼

 

For Jungkook, his universe has always been predicated on two absolute universal truths, so assured that he's sure that even if Newton's laws crumbled to dust and time ceased that he would stay steady, drawn in and held tightly by his own assurance. They are the heliocentric center of his universe, propping up all else, his world rotating around him, the stars and the planets and Jungkook himself, being pulled in ever closer and closer by the laws of gravity and of halcyon nights and cicadas. 

The first is that summer is the best time of the year. Jungkook loves nothing more than the blistering heat, the slight discomfort that makes the first dive in the freezing water all the more sweeter. Jungkook doesn't understand those who prefer the chill to heat, finding that it gets in his bones far too easily and stays there, no matter how many times he tries to shake it off, bury it in layers of scratchy clothing and drown it with too-sweet hot chocolate. He'll never love the cloudy rain as he loves the searing, hot thunderstorms that crackle and burn after a hot summer afternoon. He'll never love the snow as much as he loves the bright heat of the sun that shines so brightly and seems to strip him bare, strip them all bare, in the most intimate and caring of ways.

The second is that as bright as the sun shines, Taehyung is all the more brighter.   
  


☼☼☼

I

Great is the sun, and wide he goes

Through empty heaven with repose; 

And in the blue and glowing days 

More thick than rain he showers his rays...

_ Robert Louis Stevenson _

☼☼☼  
  


Jungkook has always loved summer, because summer means his older brother coming home from college, scooping him up and throwing him over his shoulder, taking him to the pool and on car rides with his friends, who all talk to Jungkook like he's their age even though he's eleven years younger, which feels like a lifetime. 

But this summer, his mom sat him down and told him that his brother was working overseas and couldn't come home, and that she needed to work an extra job to pay for Jungkook's education, so she was sending him to a sleep-away camp for the summer that had scholarships for kids "like him"—he wasn't sure what that meant but he didn't like the sound of it.

But Jungkook wasn't going to cry. He wasn't going to hug his mother and cry in front of the other boys. At nine years old, he knew that others were already starting to go to sleep away camp, and he'd always been independent enough for his mother to count on him. He hadn't cried on his first day at kindergarten, and he wasn't about to start now.

His mother drove him two hours and bought him an ice cream because he supposes she felt a little guilty about the whole thing, shipping him off, even if Jungkook was happy enough to go. He sat licking the remnants of the cone off of his fingers when she pulls up to the place; it was down back roads and through the forest, which Jungkook had never known. He'd grown up in a fast beach town, tasting the salt on his tongue and the wind at his back. Here, the wind doesn't blow; it whispers, and the trees whisper back as if they had a dirty little secret that only they could share. 

"Are you ready, sweetie?" she asks, and Jungkook nods and shrugs, nonchalant.

Jungkook would be lying if he said that he wasn't nervous. He didn't have many—well, any—friends at school, and he'd always had a hard time getting people to like him. His mother said that he was just quiet, his father said that he was a little "odd", but "there was nothing wrong with that", and everyone else just seemed to think he was . . . weird.

So Jungkook nods and his mother ruffles his hair and calls him her brave little Jungkookie, and he sighs. He might have been nervous, but he certainly wasn't going to show it.

All thoughts of being stoic flew out of his head when he saw the size of the boys. They were all taller than him; Jungkook knew that he was young for the fifth grade (the cutoff for this session of the camp), but he'd skipped a grade, and his mother always said that meant he was smart, but now he was just wishing that he was taller.

They walk up to the check-in and an older counselor smiles at him. "Name tags are right here," she says, pointing to a basket. Jungkook finds his name and slips it on. "Can I get you checked in?"

Jungkook shrugs, feeling like he didn't really have a choice.

"Do you have any roommate requests?" asks the counselor.

Jungkook looks up at her. "What?"

"Usually people bring a couple of their friends to the camps," says the counselor. "Is there anyone—"

Jungkook just shrugs again, shoulders slumping to the ground. He feels a couple of stares, some pitying, some mirthful, pointed at his back. They only seem to weigh his shoulders down more. 

One of the boys from a close group peers over at him and walks over, throwing his arm around him. "Hey!" he grins. "Long time no see, Jungkook."

Jungkook wants to ask how this boy knows his name, but then he realizes his name tag and feels stupid. His smile is bright, maybe a little too bright, and squared-shaped. He knows that it should look odd, but it doesn't on him, and he feels . . . warm.

The boy looks at the counselor. "Jungkook's going to be my bunkmate," he chirps. "I'm really excited! We're going to have the coolest cabin—"

He steers Jungkook away and his mother waves at him and then she's gone, but Jungkook finds that he doesn't feel as abandoned as he thought he would.

"Thank you," he says when they're out of earshot. He glances at the boy's name tag. "Taehyung."

"You're welcome!" the boy grins. "Anyway, you're in luck. I don't know anybody here, either."

"But you were talking—"

"I talk with everybody," says Taehyung. "It's just what I do."

"Oh." For some reason Jungkook thought he was special. He's not. Obviously. He met Taehyung, like, five seconds ago.

"But since we're bunkmates, I guess I'm going to be talking to you the most, huh?" Taehyung says, and pokes him in the stomach. Jungkook grins at him. 

"Yeah," he says. "I guess."

  
  
  


"Do you want top bunk or bottom bunk?"

"I don't like the top," says Jungkook. "Feels like I'm gonna fall."

"Well, that works for me," Taehyung says. "I don't like the bottom. Feels like the person's gonna fall on me."

"Great," Jungkook says. "Now I'm going to be thinking about that. Thanks, Taehyung."

"You worry a lot, don't you?" Taehyung says, climbing up to the top and swinging his legs. "C'mon. Try it."

Jungkook shakes his head. "No thanks," he says.

"Okay," Taehyung says, standing up and jumping off the ladder in one fell swoop. Jungkook blinks. "We have arts and crafts first. Let's get there first so we get all the good stuff!"

He links their arms and they walk off, and Jungkook thinks he's found a friend.

 

 

The next day, they're informed that they're going to go swimming for the first time and have to be in the lake in ten minutes after lunch or else. 

"I don't know how I feel about the lake," says Jungkook. "It's all dark and stuff."

"It's just a lake, Jungkookie," says Taehyung. Somehow, "Jungkook" has morphed into "Jungkookie". Jungkook doesn't know how. He’s learned, after a few short hours with Taehyung, that it’s best just not to argue. "There's nothing bad in it. Besides, I thought you said you were from the coast?"

"I am," Jungkook says. "But the water is . . . shallower there, in some parts. And it's safer."

"There are literal shakes in the ocean and you're worrying about a dumb lake?" Taehyung asks, shaking his head.

"I don't know," says Jungkook. "Hey. You don't have a towel."

Taehyung stops by the docks, looking out over the lake and sighing. "Yeah."

"Or swim shorts!" says Jungkook accusingly. "Are you gonna make me swim by myself?"

Taehyung shrugs. "Sorry, Jungkookie," he says, and he really does sound sorry. "I can't go swimming."

"Why?" Jungkook asks, but Taehyung just shrugs and looks at the ground.

"You should go swimming, though," Taehyung says, pulling out something from his drawstring. It's a book. 

Jungkook looks at him, then looks at everyone jumping into the lake, and follows them, leaving Taehyung behind. 

He jumps in the deep end, knowing full well he can swim well enough. The first thing he notices is that it's cold. Really cold. Much colder than the ocean, which always feels so warm and friendly when he slips into the waves, like the warmth of seeing an old friend. 

He treads water and looks over at Taehyung, sitting in the shade and reading by himself. So he jumps up and walks over to Taehyung, plopping down next to him, and shaking himself out like a dog. Taehyung squeals. 

"What are you doing? You're supposed to be swimming!" he accuses. 

"I wanted to see what you were reading," Jungkook says, and Taehyung grins. 

"The BFG," he says proudly, showing him the title. "I have the entire collection at home. Roald Dahl."

"Oh," Jungkook says, looking at his progress through the book. "You read quickly."

"I started it in the car," Taehyung admits. "But I could—start over. If you want. We could read together?"

Jungkook grins. "Okay."

And so they read the story of a little girl and dreams and snozzcumbers (which Jungkook laughs at and Taehyung repeats in an increasingly sillier voice that has him rolling on the ground) and of bad giants and good giants, and after awhile Jungkook feels himself getting dry, the sun soaking into his skin and he feels like he's glowing, just a little bit, under the clear summer sky.

  
  
  


When he's quite sure that everyone is asleep, Jungkook opens his eyes. "Taehyung?" he whispers. Then, louder. "Taehyung!"

Taehyung rolls over. "Wha—Kook—"

"I can't sleep," Jungkook admits. 

Taehyung shuffles around. "Just close your eyes," he says. 

"I tried that," says Jungkook, annoyed. Taehyung groans. 

"Do you wanna—" he yawns "—come up here? We can read the book."

Jungkook sits up and looks at the top bunk bed. It's scary but—being alone in the dark is scarier.

"Okay," he says, and climbs the ladder.

"Ow! Jungkook! That was my shin."

"Sorry," Jungkook says. 

"'S fine," says Taehyung. He takes a flashlight off the shelf near his bed and flicks it on. Light floods Jungkook's eyes and he rushes to smother it with a blanket.

"Sorry," Taehyung yawns, taking the book off the shelf. "Where we left off?"

Jungkook nods and Taehyung has them crawl under the blankets together so the flashlight isn't visible, but eventually he sees Jungkook's eyes unfocusing so he starts reading out loud, and doesn't stop until he hears the sound of Jungkook drifting off. 

"G'night, Kookie," he says, liking the sound of that. "I hope the BFG brings you good dreams."

  
  
  


"I have asthma," Taehyung admits the next day over breakfast. Jungkook chokes on his sausage, which, admittedly, is terrible. 

"Oh," he says. "Is that the thing where you can't breathe?"

Taehyung nods. 

"My brother has that," says Jungkook. "But he still swims."

"My parents are . . . very overprotective," says Taehyung. He pouts. "They wouldn't let me come unless I promised not to swim, and they told all the counselors." He sets his jaw. “I’ll find a way, though. I’m going to find a way to swim if it kills me.” He brightens up, as if he’s just noticed that Jungkook is there. “Anyway.”

Jungkook shrugs. "You're not missing out much," he says. He yawns. "I'm tired. Why do they make us get up so early?"

"This food is crap anyway," says Taehyung, and Jungkook gapes at him. 

"That's—that's—a bad—"

"Crap!" Taehyung grins at him. "Crap, crap, crap!"

Jungkook laughs and somewhere, over the dining hall and the lake with its icy fingers and crystal nails, the sun rises.

  
  
  


The weeks of summer always seem to fly by to Jungkook, filled with sweaty, popsicle-soaked, tag-playing days so that he feels  _ full  _ by the end, and it’s only on the last night of camp that he realizes that he’s going to miss these days of waking up in uncomfortable bunk beds to terrible breakfast food, going to sleep stuffed with ‘smores and scary stories. 

“Taehyung?” he asks in the middle of the night when he can’t sleep, when he’s sure the other boy has long since passed out. They’ve been spending most nights reading the BFG together, but they finished it the night before and now he’s not sure what to do. 

No reply. That’s odd. He’s usually pretty easy to wake up.

“Taehyung?” he asks. 

Deciding that this mystery requires investigation, he climbs up the side of the bunk bed and peeks his head over, hissing, “Taehyung!”

Taehyung’s bunk is empty—which is odd, because the light in the bathroom isn’t on, and on further inspection he isn’t there, either. His inhaler rests on the shelf of the bunk—Taehyung never goes anywhere without his inhaler.

His eyes widen, as his mind churns out fantastical, terrifying explanations of what could have happened—he could have been kidnapped, he could have been abducted by aliens, the BFG could have—

But no—giants aren’t real, and something irks the back of his head. Something’s wrong—Taehyung wouldn’t go on an adventure without him, not like this, unless—

So he finds himself running down the path—the moon is full, the stars dotting the summer sky, but the trees block out most of the light, reaching over the sky with their greedy fingers, and he finds himself stumbling. Fireflies dot the bushes, blinking out their lights like sirens. “Taehyung!” he yells. “Taehyung!”

I’m going to find a way to swim if it kills me.

The lake. Taehyung’s in the lake.

“Taehyung!” he screams, running down the path to the lake, faster than he ever thought he could. “Taehyung, where are you?”

He was right—there’s someone in the lake and they’re splashing, gasping like their life depends on it and it’s Taehyung—he’s having an asthma attack, Jungkook realizes as he tosses the inhaler to the side and strips off his sweatshirt.

“Taehyung!” He dives into the lake without a second thought—swimming lessons in the pool, but the pool was never this cold, or this dark, and he feels like he’s being swallowed up by it—his flannel pants seem to weigh him down, but he has to keep going, has to save Taehyung—

He latches onto Taehyung’s chest and drags him to the ladder of the dock, panting. Taehyung claws at his chest, and Jungkook grabs the inhaler, fits it into his mouth, tries to press down on the triggering mechanism like he’s seen him do only a handful of times.

Taehyung’s breathing subsides after a few moments, and he stares at Jungkook from hazy eyes. Now that he has Taehyung safe, the light of the fireflies seem more like fireworks than alarms, illuminating the lake like living stars. 

“Stupid–of–me,” he pants.

Jungkook shakes his head.

“Saved my life, Kookie,” he grins. Jungkook shakes his head.

“Yeah,” Jungkook breathes. “Guess I did.”

“My dad always says that you owe someone a life-debt,” says Taehyung.

“What’s that?”

“Like one, really big favor,” says Taehyung, staring at the night sky. “Thanks, Kookie.”

“You’re welcome, Tae,” says Jungkook.

Taehyung glances around, then jumps up suddenly, seizing something in his hands. “Caught one,” he breathes, opening his hand to reveal a firefly, blinking softly. “Here.” He tips it into Jungkook’s hands and grins at him. “Best friends forever?”

Jungkook holds the firefly in his hands and somehow, despite the pulsating light of its little body, Taehyung seems even brighter to him. “Best friends forever.”

  
  
  


Taehyung scribbles something down on a paper on the morning when the parents are picking them up. Jungkook tilts his head. “What’s that?”

“Email address,” says Taehyung, holding it out. “For my school. Do you have one?”

Jungkook shakes his head, taking the paper almost reverently.

“We can write letters with it,” says Taehyung. “See?”

Jungkook looks at him and grins. “Sure,” he says. “See you next year?”

“See you next year, Kookie!” Taehyung grins.  
  
  


 

Jungkook’s mother helps him set up an email account, after the obligatory talk that he is not supposed to talk to strangers on the internet and that he does not give out his email address to anyone except his friends, especially adults. He listens for as long as he has to, and then he signs on eagerly, typing in Taehyung’s address, with a school domain name, into the keyboard carefully, checking it over three times

 

**To: kim.taehyung.13@dgschools.org**

**From: jungkookie90197@gmail.com**

**Hi!! It’s me, Jungkook!**

 

He’s not sure how to phrase his first email, so he sends it after a couple minutes of agonizing. When he doesn’t get a response back right away, he sulks for a bit, leaving his computer and spending the rest of the day sullenly shooting baskets, willing himself to grow taller so he can make the shot. When he returns, sweaty and tired, his mother looks up from where she was chopping up watermelon.

“I think you got an email,” she says, and Jungkook all but flings himself upstairs to the computer room.

 

**To: jungkookie90197@gmail.com**

**From: kim.taehyung.13@dgschools.org**

**Hi!! How’s the rest of your summer been? I’m sending you my phone number so we can talk—Tae**

 

Jungkook grins and begins to type out a response.

 

☼☼☼

II

Come we to the summer, to the summer we will come, 

For the woods are full of bluebells and the hedges full of bloom...

_ James Whitcomb Riley _

☼☼☼

 

“Kookie!” Taehyung is running towards him, a whole year older but just the same. “C’mon, let’s go get signed in.”

“Taehyung,” Jungkook grins. They’d been talking, through emails on the phone the whole school year, but hadn’t met in a year. “I, uh, missed you.”

“Aw,” Taehyung grabs him by the neck and pulls him into his shoulder. “Missed you too, Kookie.”

Taehyung still can’t swim, but that’s alright because Jungkook and he stay by the pool and he reads a new book this time  _ The Hobbit,  _ and tells him that he has the entire series in his bunk. He asks Jungkook if he wants to swim again. 

“Do  _ you?”  _ asks Jungkook, and Taehyung shakes his head, laughing. 

“Alright, then,” says Jungkook, resting his head on Taehyung’s stomach. It’s become comfortable, this way, and he doesn’t bother acknowledging some of the glances they’re getting. He’s missed Taehyung, that’s all. “Keep reading.”

So Taehyung reads to him the stories of Bilbo Baggins the words sounding like silver on his tongue, and Jungkook finds himself watching the way the sunlight plays off the lake, the way the wind whips through the grasses and the sand, and then finally rests his gaze on his best friend, who wanders through mountain passages and fights with goblins and dragons. 

 

☼☼☼

III

In the wild soft summer darkness 

How many and many a night we two together...

_ Sara Teasdale _

☼☼☼

 

Then Jungkook is eleven and Taehyung is grinning at him from across the campfire, bits of marshmallow oozing into the fire. The sky is wide above them and Graham cracker crumbs line his mouth, bits of marshmallow clinging from his mouth. The counselors declared that they were allowed to stay out late tonight—so long as they were separated by gender. That means some of the boys are getting rowdy; it doesn’t really make any difference to Jungkook, so long as he and Taehyung are kept together. 

“Who do you think the prettiest girl here is?” asks one of the boys suddenly.

A couple of the boys voice their opinion. Taehyung is quiet. Jungkook pokes him. 

“Your marshmallow is melting,” he says. Taehyung watches it fall into the fire where the outside chars and burns, like a human sacrifice, like an act of self-immolation. “Are you okay?”

“Who do you think the prettiest girl here is?” he asks. 

“I don’t know,” he says. He hasn’t really paid much attention to the girls; the time when he sees them the most are at the lake, after lunch. Taehyung still can’t swim; but they’ve been making their way through a set of Greek myths that Taehyung inherited from his older brother. “Uh, Jisoo?” A lot of the boys are saying her name. 

“Oh,” says Taehyung quietly. “Okay.”   
“Are you alright, Taehyung, really?”

Taehyung shakes his head. “It’s okay, Jungkook,” he says quietly. “I don’t feel well. I’m going to go back to the cabins.”

And then he’s gone; the fire dances on his retreating back and Jungkook hesitates for a moment before following him.

“Taehyung!” he calls after him. “Wait up!”

Taehyung turns back. “Jungkook,” he says quietly. “You didn’t have to—”

“Of course,” says Jungkook, waving his hand. “Do you want to go to the nurse?”

Taehyung shakes his head. “It’s not that kind of sickness,” he says. “My head just hurts.”   


“Oh,” says Jungkook sympathetically. “You brought books with you this time, right?”   


“Yeah,” Taehyung shrugs. “Just the Greek myths and the BFG.”   


“Again?” asks Jungkook. 

“I brought it last year,” says Taehyung quietly. “Kept it in my bag. I don’t know. I just like having it.”

“I’ll read it to you, then,” says Jungkook, grinning, slinging an arm around his shoulder. He doesn’t notice the way that Taehyung smiles softly, sadly at him. “And then you’ll feel better?”   


“Sounds great, Kookie,” says Taehyung.

“You bet it does,” Jungkook says, licking marshmallow from his lips and steering them home.

  
  
  


“Hey, Kookie?”   


“Yeah, Tae?” Jungkook and Taehyung fell asleep when he was reading, a particularly long story in Taehyung’s book of legends about a warrior and a city and a beautiful princess who was stolen. 

“What do you think about Achilles?”

“I don’t know,” says Jungkook. “It’s sad, I guess. That he died.”

“Maybe not,” says Taehyung. “What about Patroclus?”

“What d’you mean?”

“I don’t know,” says Taehyung. “They got to be together eventually, right?”

“That’s some sappy shit,” says Jungkook. 

“Jungkook!” Taehyung hits him. “Curse words!”   


Jungkook smiles through the darkness. “I don’t know. They were best friends, I guess.”

“Best friends,” Taehyung lingers.    


“Well,” says Jungkook. “I solemnly swear that if you get killed, I will kill all of the people who killed you.”   


“Aw, thanks bro.”

“You’re welcome, bro.”   


“Night, bro.”

“Night, Tae.”

 

☼☼☼

IV

Summer night—

even the stars

are whispering to each other.

_ Kobayashi Issa _

☼☼☼

 

"Kookie!"

Taehyung is running towards him—and shit, when did he get so tall? Jungkook blinks. 

"Hey, Tae," he says quietly. 

"You've gotten taller," Taehyung says, ruffling his hair. "Great news! My parents finally said that I can go swimming and I did swimming lessons at the Y so we’re all good.”   
He cocks his head at Jungkook. “Are you okay?”   
“Fine,” says Jungkook, wondering why he suddenly feels nervous. It’s fine. This is fine. “How are you?”

“Like I didn’t talk to you, like, yesterday,” says Taehyung, elbowing him. Jungkook jolts back. 

“That wasn’t in person, though,” says Jungkook. 

“I know,” says Taehyung, then softly, “I missed you too.” He grins cheekily. “I see you haven’t gotten any taller.”

“Yes, I have!” Jungkook glares at him. “It’s not my fault you’re a giant!”   
“I may be a giant, but you are a midget,” Taehyung observes. “C’mon, let’s go to the dorms. I want food!”   
  


  
  


The lake is just as he remembers it; vast, far-off kayakers flashing their fins like birds resting on the surface of the water, algae and scum waiting on the bottom of the shallow end, the man-made beach with rough sand that no one wants to sit on, and the deep end—seemingly endless, dark, even with the sun shining above them. 

Taehyung hesitates. 

“We don’t have to go in today,” says Jungkook. “If you don’t want to.”

Taehyung frowns. “No,” he says. “No, I want to.” He stops by the edge of the water. “I want to.”

“If you say so,” says Jungkook. He hesitates. “Or, we could just read."

"I don't want to keep you from swimming," says Taehyung. 

"Tae, I really don't even like swimming, you know," says Jungkook, but Taehyung isn't listening. He walks determinedly out to the dock and stops by the edge, lowering a single toe in to trail through the water. 

"So cold," he says. "Is it always this cold?"

"It usually is," says Jungkook, shaking his head. "Taehyung, really—-"

"No," says Taehyung, clenching his jaw. "I want to swim."

Jungkook sighs, feeling like he should have expected his friend's stubbornness. "Well," he says. "I don't."

Taehyung raises an eyebrow at him. 

"I ate a lot of food and you aren't supposed to swim for an hour after you eat or you'll get cramps," says Jungkook.

"Nah," says Taehyung. "That's just what my mom says."

"Well, I'm not swimming," says Jungkook, crossing his arms. "Did you bring any books?"

"Um," says Taehyung. "I brought a Stephen King novel?"

"What's that?"

"He's this author that my older brother likes," says Taehyung. "It, I think. We could read that?"

"Sure," says Jungkook, grabbing him by the arm. "Let's go read that."

Taehyung finally lets the relief show on his face. "Thanks for this, Jungkook," he says. 

"Thanks for what?" Jungkook asks, grinning. He shakes his head. "Let's go read whatever this It thing is."

  
  
  


"Holy shit." Taehyung clenches the flashlight. "He just—ate him!"

"What the fuck, what the fuck," Jungkook shakes his head. "I don't like this. Why is the zombie or the leper or whatever following him what a creep—"

"Why did you decide we had to read this?"

"Why did you decide we had to buy this?"

"That's it," says Taehyung. "I'm never sleeping again."

"Me neither," says Jungkook, tucking himself beneath the blanket. Taehyung tugs. 

"Hey," he says. "My bed, my blanket."

"Well, you brought the book that gave me nightmares so you have to share," says Jungkook logically. Taehyung shakes his head. 

"Just go sleep in your own bed."

"I don't want to sleep in that bed, that bed is on the ground," says Jungkook. "I feel safer up here."

"Scared."

"Then why don't you go sleep on the ground?"

Taehyung relents at this and lets Jungkook share the blanket. They lie in silence for a few moments. 

"Your brother gave you the book?"

"I more . . . stole it."

"Jesus Christ, Tae."

"Wow, cursing."

"That's not even cursing," says Jungkook, rolling onto his side and propping himself up with an elbow. "Only if you're religious, and I'm not."

Taehyung is quiet. "My parents are," he says. 

"Oh," says Jungkook. "I didn't know."

"Like, not screaming on the street corners and all that," says Taehyung. "But . . . a bit . . ."

"My mom makes us go for Christmas and Easter sometimes," says Jungkook. "But no one in my family has ever been religious, so we don't really bother. My dad goes to the temple sometimes."

"Ah," says Taehyung, for lack of anything else to say. They lie in silence for a few more minutes. 

"Okay, I'm not sleeping," says Jungkook 

"Me neither."

Taehyung sits up. "Teach me how to swim?"

"Right now, Tae? The hell?"

"Hey, no cursing needed," says Taehyung. "C'mon, I want to go swim and you're coming with me."

"Jerk," says Jungkook, following him down the ladder anyway. "It's going to be freezing. You know that, right?"

"It's always freezing though," says Taehyung, pulling on a sweatshirt. 

"You're not going to want that," Jungkook warns, searching for his swimming trunks and finally giving up. "Fuck it."

Taehyung finds a flashlight and flicks it on—-it bathes the whole room in light and a few of the boys groan, so he flicks it off just as quickly. "You've become so foul since I've left you. What are those punks at your school teaching you?"

"Nothing," says Jungkook, putting his hands in his pockets. Taehyung had hit a sore spot. "I don't have that many friends at school, anyway." 

"Oh," says Taehyung, blinking, then grinning. "Me neither."

Jungkook peers at him. "But you're so—-"

"What?"

"You," says Jungkook for lack of a better word. "You talk to everybody."

"I know, but I think it weirds some people out," says Taehyung, looking around and sneaking a glance at their counselors, who have long since passed out. "Do you think they have people on the roof watching?"

"It's three in the morning, Taehyung," says Jungkook, checking his watch. It's glow-in-the-dark, and was the pride of his Christmas. "I doubt it."

"Alright," says Taehyung, stepping outside. The night air is muggy, warm, and settles over them like a thick blanket, the sound of crickets singing perfuming the air. Fireflies dot the woods as they always do, their colors twinkling like Christmas lights. "I don't know," he says. "I don't see why people wouldn't like you."

"In case you haven't noticed, Tae, I'm awkward as hell."

"I know, but you're like," Taehyung gestures, like he's looking for a better word. "Small. And sweet."

"Aw. Thanks. That's what every guy wants to hear."

"You know what I mean," says Taehyung. "You're a cool kid, when you actually start talking."

"Problem is I don't talk to anyone," says Jungkook, kicking a root. 

"You talk to me."

Jungkook glances at him. "You're different."

They've reached the lake and Taehyung glances at it. "I should probably take off the sweatshirt now?"

Jungkook wets his mouth. "Yeah," he says. "You do that.”   
"I don't know how I feel about this," says Jungkook, frowning a bit. 

"What do you mean?" asks Taehyung, turning back around. Jungkook shouldn't feel weird being shirtless around him; they've changed in the same room enough times. He doesn't know. Things just feel weird all of a sudden, and he doesn't know how to put them back to normal. 

"You getting in the lake," says Jungkook, staring. "I had to drag you out last time." He glances at Taehyung. "You don't even have your inhaler."

"Don't need it anymore most times," says Taehyung, shaking his head. "Most of the time I just take medicine for it.”   
“And that gets rid of it?”   
“Mostly,” Taehyung shrugs, standing on the edge of the dock. “So should I just jump in or—-ahhh—-”

He's cut off when Jungkook shoves him into the water, yelling as he does."What the fuck, Jeon?" he yells, looking at Jungkook while he flails around the water. Jungkook grins and jumps in beside him, tucking in his arms and curling up so he splashes Taehyung as much as possible. 

"Hang onto the edge," says Jungkook, showing him. "And tread water."

Taehyung struggles to keep his head above the water. "So—much—easier—in—heated—pool," he says. 

"I know," Jungkook says. "You know, I'm used to swimming in the ocean."

"You've told me, surfer boy."

"Oh, shut up," Jungkook splashes him. "You should visit me sometime. We could go swimming together, and it's a lot warmer."

"Aren't there riptides though?"

"Sometimes," Jungkook shrugs, pushing off from the dock and doing a few experimental strokes around the swimming area. "But you get used to it eventually, I guess."

Taehyung looks at him curiously. "You actually like swimming, then?"

"I guess?" Jungkook treads water and thinks, glancing up at the stars as he does. He likes the way that the water covers him. He feels oddly naked, vulnerable even though he's just wearing boxers, but the way that the water washes over him makes him feel somehow whole again. He supposes that it's there to remind him that, in the long run, all water comes from the ocean and that somewhere far from this lake the water turns salty and the moon pulls the currents back and forth like a gentle dance "I never really thought about it before."

"I've been keeping you from swimming all this time," says Taehyung, glancing down guiltily. 

Jungkook shrugs. "I don't really mind," he says. "I prefer the ocean anyway, like I told you." He pries Taehyung's arms off the dock and lets his friend use him for support. The physical contact makes him a little uncomfortable, even when he's known him so long; it seems wrong, somehow, that he should touch him without asking, even when they've been friends, best friends for so long . . . "And not anymore, see?" he says, holding out their arms and letting them both tread water. "Swimming, see?"

Taehyung's teeth chatter. "Still—fucking—cold—"

Jungkook laughs. "Do you want to get out?"

Taehyung glares at him, like Jungkook suggested that he concede some sort of challenge. 

"Why are you so competitive?"

"Why are  _ you _ so competitive?"

"I asked you first," Jungkook retorts. 

"Personality flaw," Taehyung shrugs, grinning as his chin continues to shake. "We all have them. Just happens to be mine."

"Your one flaw?"

"That and my terrible self esteem," Taehyung says cheekily. 

Jungkook laughs, then pauses. "You don't mean that, do you?" he says quietly. 

"'Course not," says Taehyung, avoiding his gaze. 

"Are you sure?" asks Jungkook, peering at him. "You don't have any reason to be self-conscious, you know."

"Thanks, Kookie," says Taehyung, sounding more like he's humoring him than anything else. 

"Really!" Jungkook says. "You're amazing. I wouldn't be swimming with you in the middle of the night in this fucking cold weather if you weren't, right?"

"I guess not." Taehyung grins at him. It's odd—Jungkook is so used to being the one for Taehyung to reassure, to encourage, to talk over when he stutters so much it feels like he can't even remember the words he was going to say in the first place. It's something about the lake or the sky or the stars that brings this out, he supposes. Because the sun shines so bright, but it's in the water, under the cold moon that everything seems clearer. "I don't know," he says. "I just sometimes feel like you don't really know me."

And that kind of hurts, because sometimes Jungkook worries about that too—because even though they email every day during school almost, even though they talk at least twice a week, he sometimes worries that it isn't enough, that Taehyung will find a new best friend, that he'll want to find someone who he can be closer to. Taehyung's a cuddly person, adoring skinship, hugging all over his friends, all over Jungkook whenever they spend their summers together. 

Jungkook's never been one for touching, but he can't find himself minding it. 

But Taehyung is his summers—Taehyung is the bright sky and the sun he wakes up to and the moon he says goodnight to during these numbered days—so he can't look at the boy treading water in front of him, the black water seeming to swallow him up, like he's trying to stay afloat somehow, and say that he doesn't know how.

"I know you," he says. "You're my best friend."

"You're mine too," says Taehyung. "And nothing—nothing will change that?" 

Jungkook shakes his head. "Of course not," he says, frowning. 

Taehyung looks over Jungkook's shoulder, to the shore and beyond that the hill where the firepit rests. "Looks like some of the counselors are having a fire," he says. 

Jungkook grins and splashes. "Guess we have to keep quiet, then."

"Jungkook, what are you—hey, stop that!" Taehyung yelps when Jungkook splashes him again. "Take that, you fiend!"

"Fiend?" asks Jungkook. "Are we studying Shakespeare now?"

"Shut up," Taehyung rolls his eyes. "Achilles my ass. You're more of a Hector."

"Wounded," says Jungkook. 

"Or a Paris," adds Taehyung. 

"Paris was a punk-ass-bitch," Jungkook glares, splashing him. "Take it back!"

Taehyung just laughs at him and swims away. 

They swim like that for awhile, until Jungkook makes an executive decision to make Taehyung get out because he swears that his lips are starting to turn blue. He pulls him out of the water only when he concedes that it was absolutely, one-hundred-percent his idea and not Taehyung's, and thus Taehyung does not concede defeat in any way, shape, or form, and retains the right to call him "a punk-ass bitch".

"Looks like they've left the fire," says Jungkook, pulling on a sweatshirt and handing Taehyung his. "Put that on, you'll get cold."

"Thanks, Mom," Taehyung rolls his eyes, but he grins softly even as he says it. 

"Ungrateful child."

"C'mon, I'm cold," says Jungkook. "And they didn't put the fire out."

"So cold," says Taehyung, cuddling up to Jungkook's side as they walk, slinging arms around his shoulders and his torso. 

"Why are you doing that?" Jungkook asks. 

"Oh, sorry," says Taehyung, pulling away. 

"Nah, that's not what I meant," says Jungkook, leaning back into him. "It's just that your hands are freezing."

"Oh," Taehyung grins, grabbing him again. "You're just so warm, I guess."

Jungkook looks at Taehyung's smile, and something about the way that his friend holds him, smiles at him, looks at him like there's no one else he'd rather be freezing his ass off with—it's confusing, that's all, but he's certainly warm. Warm on the inside, even as he shivers as a breeze passes them. 

“Fireflies,” he says instead, pointing out the little yellow embers that dot the forest. Taehyung beams at him and squeezes him tighter. 

When one of them flies too close, he catches it out of the air, cupping it in his palms. He glances at Taehyung over his shoulder. 

“For you,” he says, passing it to Taehyung’s hands. “To make you feel better.” 

Taehyung stares at it reverently. “Thanks, Kookie,” he says. 

“See,” says Jungkook. “The firefly and I both think you’re amazing.” He coughs out the last part, it sounding awkward on his tongue. 

“Thanks, but I think I prefer you to the firefly,” says Taehyung, opening his hands so it can fly away. 

“Hurtful,” says Jungkook. “Why’d you do that?”   
Taehyung shrugs. “Just wanted him to be free, I guess.”

"Look," he coughs out at least when they reach the embers of the fire. "Didn't they tell us that we should put it out right or we'll start a forest fire?"

"They also said no boy-girl mixing but that certainly doesn't apply to a certain Leeteuk and—"

"Ugh, we all know at this point," says Jungkook, covering his ears and dropping down beside the fire. "What about you?"

"What about me?" asks Taehyung, poking the embers with a stick and watching the way that sparks dance upwards. 

"Never hear you talk about any girls and stuff," says Jungkook, his stomach feeling funny even as he mentions it. He doesn't know why, but he's hoping that Taehyung doesn't have anybody back home—why is that? Taehyung's his friend, he wants him to be happy . . . maybe he just doesn't want him to have a girlfriend before Jungkook does, it would be embarrassing to be teased about it . . .

"Taehyung?" he asks, looking at him. Taehyung seems to have gone very pale, and it doesn't seem to be from the cold or the swimming. Even in the dark, Jungkook can read the apprehension on his face. "What's wrong?"

Taehyung hesitates. 

“Jungkook,” says Taehyung quietly, staring at the dead embers, then at the sky as if he hopes that somewhere someone is listening. He sounds like he’s apologizing, but Jungkook doesn’t know what for. “I think I’m—I mean, I think I know—” he hesitates “—I’m gay.”

“Oh,” says Jungkook. “Uh—thanks?” He feels kind of sick to his stomach, kind of like he’s having a heart attack and he doesn’t know why. Is he really  _ that  _ homophobic? He’s heard the jokes, dumb middle school stuff, but he’s never thought that he’d be the type to succumb to that kind of ignorant thinking. His parents are amazing people—they always raised him to see the best in people, and to not judge others, especially for things that they can’t change. “For telling me?”

Taehyung is his best friend. Jungkook cares for him so  _ so  _ much. This shouldn’t change anything about the way that he sees him. 

Then why does he suddenly feel sick to his stomach, looking at the firelight reflecting his features? What’s wrong with him? Taehyung’s his best friend—of course he accepts him, of course this doesn’t change his opinion of him—

“You don’t have to, like, say that you accept me or whatever,” says Taehyung after a pause. “Just please don’t tell anyone.”   
“What are you talking about, Tae?” Jungkook asks. “Of course—of course I’m not gonna, like, tell anyone or judge you or shit.” He clears his throat. “You’re my best friend. Still.” He blinks. “Always. How could you even think that this would matter to me?” That came out wrong. It  _ does  _ matter, somehow, he just hasn’t figured out how. 

“Oh,” says Taehyung. He blinks. “Thanks.”

He gives Jungkook the wide, boxy smile that he’s used to, but it doesn’t make him feel warm like it usually does. 

Something is definitely wrong with him. 

 

**From: Jeon Jungkook's iPhone**

**To: Unknown**

**> >Hey! It's Jungkook!! I just got a phone. What's up?**

 

He types and retypes the message about five times before he sends it. Taehyung's reply is almost instant.

 

**From: Kim Taehyung (camp)**

**To: Jeon Jungkook's iPhone**

**> >Not much. Just chillin' in the shower.**

 

**From: Jeon Jungkook's iPhone**

**To: Kim Taehyung**

**> >You take your phone in the shower???**

 

**From: Taehyung**

**To: Jeon Jungkook's iPhone**

**> >Plastic bag**

 

**From: Jeon Jungkook's iPhone**

**To: Tae**

**> >Oh my god that's genius **  
  


☼☼☼

V

And reflected on the faded tapestries now;

the chill, uncertain sunlight of those long

childhood hours when you were so afraid.

_ Rainer Maria Rilke _

☼☼☼  
  


Jungkook doesn't let on that anything's wrong with him and Taehyung, not to his mother, who at this point has grown accustomed to asking how he's doing, even if they can only meet up during the year maybe a couple times if they're lucky, because they live so far away and Jungkook knows that gas isn't cheap for Taehyung family. He never says much about it, but Jungkook can tell by now—he can see that he wears a lot of the same clothes every summer, the same gear. Not to mention that he knows that the summer camp he goes to isn't exactly for the most bourgeoise of families to send their children. 

Not that he minds. Taehyung's hoodies are comfortable, even more comfortable when they're worn so much and familiar to him every summer (he always ends up stealing them; Taehyung complains the first few weeks of every summer but his protests die down by the end when he realizes that resistance is futile). Taehyung has a good flashlight, and they know their way down to the lake and around the camp well enough after so many years. And he likes that he goes to this summer camp, even if the only swimming pool is a lake and even if all of the sports gear has been used for at least a decade. It means that he gets to be with Taehyung, his best friend, even if he can't shake the feeling that something is wrong. 

Not wrong with Taehyung. Wrong with him. He can't bring himself to tell his parents about his best friend's sexuality, and he sure as hell isn't going to mention it to the few school "friends" he has, not with all the jokes that he hears them make on a regular basis about gay people. It makes him comfortable, and he tells himself it's for Taehyung's sake. 

He doesn't even know why it matters so much—if he did tell his parents, his father would probably shrug, and his mother would probably not and tell Jungkook to look out for him in that sympathetic tone of hers, despite the fact that it's Taehyung who looks out for Jungkook, and not the other way around. It's always been Taehyung who looks out for Jungkook. 

So what's wrong with him? Why is it that whenever he gets a text from Taehyung he feels that familiar sickness in the pit of his stomach, why is it that whenever he thinks about Taehyung being gay, about him finding some guy at his school that he wants to throw up or throw his phone away? 

It's on him, he knows. Not on Taehyung—he didn't choose this, and Jungkook certainly isn't going to be a shitty best friend and let it show how much it bothers him. And it shouldn't bother him. 

So when he meets Taehyung the next year for camp, he pulls him into a hug and lets himself breath in the scent of his clothing—it's the laundry detergent that he uses at the beginning of each camp session, before all of their clothes go to the camp laundry mat and it fades away. He's gotten taller, he realizes—their eyelines are barely a centimeter or two apart. And he pretends not to let himself or Taehyung notice, too, how the feeling seems to fade away when Taehyung raises his arms and hugs him back.

  
  
  


Taehyung gets sick that night at camp—Jungkook doesn't know why, but he thinks it has something to do with the air, or something that one of the other campers brought or, or, it could just be that they've finally got their penance for all the nighttime swims. 

It began innocently enough, Jungkook guesses—Taehyung suggesting that they get more privacy and space during the night, whereas during the day the swimming area is choked with campers fighting over tubes and balls, so much that it's hard to find space to swim. And then it just started to become a regular thing, no matter how many times they wake up tired from staying out so late, no matter how many times they realize they've fallen asleep on the beach—Jungkook's head always somehow finding its way into Taehyung's lap, whatever book they've been reading (lately, it's been The Great Gatsby, which Taehyung insists is a work of literary genius, while Jungkook thinks all the characters are just stupid) sprawled across Taehyung's chest, his fingers in Jungkook's hair. 

He feels like they're skirting something dangerous on mornings like those. Sometimes he wakes up first and finds that he's more comfortable there, soaking in Taehyung's body heat, the honey energy that seems to seep off his skin, the content expression on his face when he sleeps. The way that the sun peeks over the lake, setting the world on fire and sometimes Jungkook thinks that he'd be willing to burn if he could burn next to his best friend. 

So Jungkook mopes by the nurse's office for awhile, until she tells him that he really needs to get back to his normal activities. Taehyung encourages him to go on, to do whatever kickball-arts-and-cracks-drama-campfire-etc. the campers have planned.

Luckily, Jungkook has never been one for following directions. 

He piles up a plate full of double-servings of the cafeteria food—for once it isn't terrible. The kitchen staff made some kind of frozen-dough rolls, which, while artificial, have enough sugar in their terribly uniform shapes to keep him satisfied. Figuring that sugar is good for healing, he dumps the entire lot of them into his backpack, along with some sausage and other assorted goods. 

"That's not good for you," remarks one of the boys. Kibum, he recognizes. 

"It's not for me," says Jungkook, zipping up his backpack. "I'm going to visit Taehyung."

"Of course you are," says Kibum, rolling his eyes. 

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You guys, are like, married," says Kibum. He nudges the boy next to him. "Minhyuk, back me up."

"No," says Minhyuk, glaring at him. 

"No?"

"I think you're being kinda stupid," says Minhyuk. "The two of you have been friends, since, like, birth, right?"

"Age nine," says Jungkook, hoisting the bag over his shoulder and standing uncomfortably. He doesn't want to stick around for this conversation, but he feels like by leaving he'd be proving something to them. He doesn't know what yet. 

"Just saying," says Kibum. "You two are, like, joined at the hip."

A boy next to him, Wonho, shrugs. "Yeah," he says. "You guys kinda look at each other weird, too."

"We're friends," says Jungkook, almost desperately. "Of course we look at each other, what the fuck is that supposed to mean?

"Like, lovey-dovey, though," says Wonho. "Be honest, are you gay for him? Do you  _ love  _ him?"

"Or is he gay for you?" asks Kibum curiously. “Or, like, mutual gay dickave?”

"Are you going to—"

"Nobody's—" Jungkook wants to clamp his hands over his ears. "I'm straight, alright? End of story."

"Sounds like what a gay guy would say," says Kibum, shrugging. "Go do your thing with your boyfriend, I guess."

Jungkook stares him down for a second, then spins on his heel and stalks off. He arrives at the dorm, slamming the door open.

"What’s—" Taehyung sits up on his bunk. The nurse made him move to the bottom bunk, not trusting him to climb to the top when he started complaining of dizziness. "Oh. Kookie." He grins. 

"I brought you food," says Jungkook, not able to stop the anger from creeping into his tone. 

"Is everything alright?" asks Taehyung, sitting up and hacking a cough. His eyes—wide, concerned, and innocent, so innocent of everything that Jungkook has churning around in his stomach. 

"'Course it is," says Jungkook. He plucks a book off the ground. Gatsby. "What's this?"

"Oh," says Taehyung. "I was trying to read but my headache is too bad."

"I'll read it to you," says Jungkook. "And they better all be dead by the end."

Taehyung shakes his head, laughing. "All of them?"

"Yeah," says Jungkook. "All of them. They're all terrible people, Taehyung."

"What about Nick?"

"Nick's an idiot," says Jungkook. "Jordan is terrible. So is Daisy. And that Tom Buchanan—"

"I think he's just blinded," says Taehyung. 

"Who? Nick?"

"Yeah," Taehyung muses. "By Gatsby."

"Whatever." Jungkook waves his hand. "Alright. Let's start again." He clears his throat. "  _ ‘ “We haven't met for many years," said Daisy . . . ' _ "

 

☼☼☼

VI

I know I am but summer to your heart,

And not the full four seasons of the year…

_ Edna St. Vincent Millay _

☼☼☼

 

The next summer Taehyung greets him with a grin and then promptly smacks him in the chest with a book. 

"I have to read this by the end of the summer," he says. "You're helping me."

"You're the one who's supposed to do the reading," says Jungkook, stepping back and pocketing his phone, handing the book back to Taehyung. "Every time I do it I end up stuttering like an idiot."

"Not true!" says Taehyung. "Those times you read for me you were great at it.”

Jungkook rolls his eyes. “I read to you, like, once.”

“Twice,” says Taehyung. “That one time by the fire when you were twelve and again last year when I was sick.”

Jungkook tilts his head. “You remember that?”

Taehyung grins. “’Course I do,” he says. “This is Shakespeare, and we need to read, like, eight of them by the end of the summer.”

“You know, when my mom signed me up for summer camp I didn’t realize that she signed me up for nonstop book club too.”

Taehyung rolls his eyes. “You love my book club,” he says

Jungkook sighs. “Sure, Tae,” he says.

“Look,” says Taehyung. “We can act it out. It’ll be fun, trust me. I did acting club and this one guy and I did lines a lot and we ended up being friends by the end of it.”

“We’re  _ already  _ friends, Tae,” Jungkook says, but something about the way that Taehyung talks about the other guy gets on his nerves. “What other guy?” It’s the first he’s hearing of it, and he and Taehyung text every day.

“I’m not going to replace you, Kookie,” Taehyung says, patting him on the shoulder consolingly. “His name is Minjae. He’s really nice! I should introduce you sometime.” He grins. “Cute, too.”

It’s back again, the feeling that he thought was gone but comes back every so often—that sickness every time that he’s reminded of his best friend’s sexual orientation.

“I was just kidding, Jungkookie,” Taehyung says, tilting his head. “You’re cute too, don’t worry.”

“Thanks,” he says.

Taehyung perks up. “Want to go for a swim tonight?”

“You know we have time at the lake later today, right?”

“I know,” says Taehyung, swaying back and forth. “But it’s a lot more fun to run lines alone.”

Jungkook nods and tries not to think about Taehyung running lines alone with his  _ friend,  _ Minjae, who happens to be cute.

  
  
  


“Dark tonight,” Taehyung comments, glancing up through the trees. When he was younger, Jungkook thought that they looked like hungry, skeletal hands reaching out for the light of the sky—now, he finds the patterns they make comforting, familiar.

Jungkook shrugs. The moon has waned to a thin crescent. “Fireflies are here for us, though,” he says.

Taehyung flicks on the flashlight and Jungkook yelps. “We don’t even need that!” he says.

“I want to read,” says Taehyung, settling down on the dock and opening his book. “Here,” he says. “Choose one.”

“Uh,  _ Macbeth,”  _ says Jungkook.

“No, I’ve already read that one.”

“On your own?” Jungkook complains in mock offense. “You told me you needed help.”

“I was bored and it has swords and stuff,” says Taehyung. He flips through the book. “Don’t choose something like  _ Richard II,  _ do something easy we already know the plot of . . .”

“I don’t know  _ any  _ Shakespeare,” says Jungkook, shaking his head.

“Yes, you do,” says Taehyung. “The plot of  _ The Lion King  _ is the same as  _ Hamlet.” _

“No, it’s not.”

“Yes, it is.” Taehyung shoves the book at his chest. “Here. You be Barnardo.”

  
  
  


“Oh my god, it is.”

“I  _ know _ , right?”

  
  
  


The nights at the lake when they’re supposed be swimming slowly turn into reading, Taehyung doing exaggerated voices and Jungkook stumbling through his lines as best he can with Taehyung’s encouragement. He’s never liked drama, never liked performing, but somehow Taehyung makes him feel a little less of an idiot. He likes this, he realizes; he likes their nights by the lake, he likes putting his head on Taehyung’s chest while his friend holds the book above them so they can both read it, just the moon and the stars and the fireflies as their audience. And he feels it coming to an end all too soon.

“Last one,” says Taehyung.

“Last night or last play?” asks Jungkook.

“Both,” Taehyung shrugs. “We have next year, though, right?”

Jungkook nods. “Then college,” he says quietly.

“I’m just one year above you, though,” says Taehyung, sitting up. “We can go to the same college and everything.” He grins at Jungkook, pinching his cheek. “Then every day is like summer camp.”   
  


“Did you just  _ pinch my cheek?”  _ Jungkook asks, elbowing him in the chest. Taehyung strokes Jungkook’s hair apologetically and he lets his head fall back into Taehyung’s chest. “And I don’t think that’s how college works.”

“Whatever,” Taehyung snorts. “We can still be counselors together.”

Something about the idea of being around Taehyung all the time in college—about them being counselors together—warms Jungkook’s chest, lights a little fire of  _ hope  _ there, for what, he doesn’t know.

“Last play,” he says at last.

“ _ Romeo and Juliet?”  _ asks Taehyung. “It’s a classic.”

“Uh,” says Jungkook intelligently.

“Oh,” says Taehyung. “I don’t know if that’s weird to be—”

“No!” says Jungkook quickly. “No, it’s not weird.” He steals the book from Taehyung. “ _ ‘Gregory, on my word, we’ll not carry coals’.”  _ He stops. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

Taehyung is looking at him strangely, almost as if he’s having a dream with his eyes open. When he notices Jungkook looking, he jolts awake. “Look at the footnotes,” he says, somewhat rattled. “ _ ‘No, for them, we should be colliers . . .’ ” _

  
  
  


“Why do you get to be Romeo?” Jungkook complains, glancing at him.

“I’m taller.”   
“That’s sexist, fuck you.”

“Would you rather be Romeo?” asks Taehyung, narrowing his eyes.

“Fine,” says Jungkook, grabbing the script. “Jerk.”

  
  
  


“ _ ‘Have saints not lips, and holy palmers too?’”  _ Jungkook blinks. “Who actually talks like this when they’re trying to flirt?”

Taehyung shrugs. “Old people. ‘ _ Ay, pilgrim, lips that they must use in prayer.’” _

_ “‘O, then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do. Then pray; grant thou, lest faith turn to despair.’”  _ Jungkook groans. “I feel like an idiot.”

“ ‘ _ Saints do not move, though grant for prayers’ sake.’  _ Sound about right.”

“Wow, hurtful.  _ ‘Then move not, while my prayer’s ef–efect I take.”  _ Jungkook glances down at the script and the black, bold directions: KISSES HER. “Uh, I’m supposed to kiss you know.”

“What’s taking you so long?” Taehyung teases, wiggling his eyebrows. “You look like you’re going to have a heart attack, I’m kidding, Kook, honest.”

“Oh.” Jungkook grabs Taehyung’s hand from the flashlight and kisses it quickly, then blushes and drops his hand like a hot coal. “Sorry.”

“Kookie,” Taehyung hums happily, turning the page. “Don’t apologize. You’re cute.”

“Um. Oh.”

Taehyung sits up. “Are you okay?” He pokes him. “You’re being uncharacteristically non-verbal today.”

“I wouldn’t call it  _ uncharacteristically,”  _ Jungkook says, sitting up with him and trying to hide his red face in the darkness.

“Not to me,” Taehyung says quietly. “You know you can say anything, right?”

“Yeah,” says Jungkook.

“So, if I’m, like, weirding you out—”

“No,” Jungkook silences him, glancing up at last. “Never.” He holds his gaze for maybe a little longer than necessary, then turns back to the book.  _ “ ‘Thus from my lips, by thine, my sin is purged.’ ” _

Taehyung stares at him for a moment, then shakes his head, as if he’s laughing at a joke Jungkook can’t hear before continuing with the next line.

  
  
  


“ _ ‘O, speak again, bright angel . . . for thou a–art as glorious to this night, being o’er—over—my head, as is a winged messenger of heaven, unto the white, upturned, wondering eyes,”  _ Jungkook says, before pausing to take a breath.

“Wow, Kookie,” says Taehyung. “High praise.”

“What did I just say?”

“I think you just called me an angel,” says Taehyung cheekily, resting his head on Jungkook’s shoulder. “Thanks, Kook.”

And Jungkook is too tired and too open, here on the dock with Taehyung and the moonlight, to not admit at least to himself that maybe Taehyung, the light radiating off his skin, kissed by the sun and adored by the moon, is some otherworldly being to him. Not that he’ll ever say it out loud.

“So,” says Taehyung. “Do you wanna finish that?”

“O–oh,” says Jungkook. “Yeah.”

“You’re not tired?” Taehyung looks at him with wide eyes. “Do you want to go to sleep?”

Jungkook shakes his head. “No,” he says, because he would stay up until the end of time to just have this moment wth Taehyung resting beside him under the stars.

  
  
  


“Wait, what just happened?”   
“Romeo went into Juliet’s room and then the Friar kicked him out in the morning,” says Taehyung. “Are you even reading this?”

“It doesn’t make any sense,” Jungkook shakes his head. “So they . . .”

“Got funky, yeah,” Taehyung grins.

Jungkook wrinkles his nose, because he feels like that’s the proper way to react to this situation. He doesn’t even  _ think  _ about Taehyung that way, how could .  . .

“They’re  _ married,  _ Jungkookie, you dork,” Taehyung laughs. “Now read your lines.”

He wonders if Taehyung is thinking about it to. Thinking about  _ them  _ that way. He wonders if that’s a bad thing. He wonders if it’s a worse thing that he hopes that he is. 

  
  
  


“…  _ ‘Here’s to my love,’”  _ Jungkook says. “I don’t have anything to drink.”   
“Just pretend,” says Taehyung, watching him with his chin in his hands, laying down on the dock.

“Why do you get to lay down but I have to sit up?”

“I’m sleeping,” says Taehyung. “Keep reading.”

_ “ ‘Oh true apothecary, thy drugs are quick. Thus with a—with a kiss, I die.”  _ He glances down at Taehyung, who laughs at him.

“Now you have to lie down too, you’re dead now—” he giggles.

Jungkook cuts him off by kissing him.

It’s quick, short, sweet—it’s not fireworks or some supreme revelation, but embarrassing and terrifying, coming off of months—years—of confusion and uncertainty about what he’s feeling but underneath it there’s something—there’s something warm and sweet and so undeniably Taehyung that it makes his heart ache.

“I’m—I’m sorry,” he says, sitting up quickly and wiping his mouth, wiping away any trace of Taehyung, staring off into the lake and wanting to dive under, to swim beneath the darkness and stay there so he won’t have to see how Taehyung is looking at him.

“Hey,” Taehyung says. “Don’t apologize to me, okay?”

Jungkook looks at him. “I didn’t mean to—”

“You regret it, then?” says Taehyung, tentatively resting a hand on Jungkook’s shoulder like he’s afraid that he’ll frighten off. “I won’t ever mention it again if you don’t want me to. I won’t try anything or—”

“No,” Jungkook shakes his head, because he’s just so  _ confused  _ but he doesn’t want Taehyung to not mention it.

“Oh,” says Taehyung. He blinks and tilts his head. “What do you want me to do?”

Jungkook just looks at him pleadingly, because he’s not sure but he knows that he wants, wants,  _ wants  _ something and he doesn’t know how to ask.

Taehyung rests his hand gently on his face, cupping it, like he understands. “This okay?” he asks.

Jungkook nods; yes, it’s okay, it’s more than okay, of course it’s okay because it’s Taehyung and he’s the sun and Jungkook feels like he’s been running from him but he doesn’t know how.

_ Are you gay for him? Do you  _ love  _ him? _

Is it love—the way he knows he looks at Taehyung like he’s all the light in the world, like his world revolves around a Taehyung-centric universe. Jungkook isn’t sure, but he thinks that maybe a little bit.

And then Taehyung is kissing him, softly, like he thinks Jungkook will run away any moment, and Jungkook kisses him back and thinks that maybe he is a bit in love with his best friend, and maybe that’s okay.

Taehyung only breaks away when he brings his hands up to show him something. “Look,” he says, opening his fingers a bit to show a bright yellow light. “Firefly.”

  
  
  


Taehyung and Jungkook say goodbye the only way they know how the next morning; Taehyung clinging onto him and Jungkook pretending like he’s annoyed by him (he’s not).

“You know,” Taehyung says, biting his lip. They haven’t spoken about what happened the night before, didn’t say anything when they woke up, Jungkook curled into Taehyung’s side, Taehyung’s arm slung along his waist, sore from sleeping on the deck and faces too close to be platonic, but somehow not uncomfortable. “That—meant something. To me, at least.”

Jungkook glances at him hesitantly, scuffing his foot on the ground. “Me too.”

“Do you think—do you think that we have a chance?” asks Taehyung. “I don’t know. At something.”

_ Something.  _ Jungkook thinks that he could settle for  _ something.  _ He thinks that he could build his entire world around  _ something. _

“I want to,” he says at last, and Taehyung perks up.

“I’ll call you,” Jungkook says.

“Not if I call you first,” Taehyung says, winking and giving him that trademark Taehyung smile and Jungkook feels that swoop in the pit of his stomach and he thinks that maybe he knows what it is now.

Shit. He’s so far gone.

  
  
  


_ “Kookie!”  _

Taehyung calls him up one night when he’s working on homework. Homework can wait. “Yeah?”

Taehyung has been calling him a lot recently. They’ve always kept in contact, but lately it’s like he can’t get enough of the other’s voice. Neither of them have brought up anything remotely beyond-platonic, but Jungkook can’t stop thinking about it, a buzz in the back of his head. 

But Taehyung does talk about being gay a bit more—talks about how he worries about his family, talks about how he worries about his church, about the people who have known him forever. As for Jungkook . . . he doesn’t know what he is, and he doesn’t feel like labeling himself, and Taehyung certainly isn’t asking him anything of the sort. 

He knows that he decided, somewhere along the way, that he loved Taehyung. Of course he loved Taehyung—he’s his best friend. But there’s something more, a love that goes beyond the platonic, and sometimes he just wishes he knew where the overlap was.

_ “I’m having a birthday party this year,” _ says Taehyung.  _ “I know you can never come ‘cause school, but I was thinking since you have your license now _ —”

“Do you want me to come?”

_ “Of course!”  _ Taehyung grins. He pauses. _ “If that’s alright with you?” _   
“No!” says Jungkook suddenly. “That’s—that’s great with me! Where is it?”

_ “It’s kinda lame, to be honest,”  _ says Taehyung.  _ “My family doesn’t have a lot of money right now so they thought it’d be cool to have it, like, in a park—” _

“Sounds amazing!” says Jungkook, trying not to sound too excited.

_ “There will be, like, barbecue and shit,”  _ says Taehyung.  _ “So I can at least say that I can feed you well.” _

“Thanks, Tae,” says Jungkook.

Taehyung gives him the address and they talk for a bit.

_ “Hey, Jungkook?”  _ Taehyung says as the conversation winds down, stifling a yawn. 

“Yeah, Tae?” he breathes. 

_ “When you see me—nothing’s changed,”  _ he clears his throat.  _ “Since last summer. Just so you know.” _

“Oh,” says Jungkook, blinking. Because he’s been hoping and hoping but to hear Taehyung say it. “Me too.”

_ “So. Something?” _

“Something,” Jungkook says quietly, and he can hear Taehyung smile through the phone. 

Jungkook only hangs up the when he hears his mother coming in to check on him.

“Who was that?” she asks.

“Nobody,” he says, suddenly defensive.

“A girl?” she asks hopefully. Jungkook feels that familiar twist in his stomach; the one that he feels whenever a well-meaning parent or relative mentions how he’s looking so handsome lately, how he’s going to drive the girls at his school wild, asking if there’s anyone who he likes and when he’s going to get married so that his parents can have grandchildren. He’s in high school, why can’t they just calm down?

Jungkook shakes his head, then pauses. “Mom . . .” he says. “If there was a girl that I liked—what would I do?”

His mother pauses. “Oh,” she says, smiling. “Is it anyone I know?”

“It’s a hypothetical!” he says.

“So it is,” his mother smiles. “There are some cute girls in your class, though . . . what about Mina, she’s pretty . . .”

_ “Mom,”  _ Jungkook stares at the ceiling.

“Flowers,” says his mother. “Girls like flowers. As long as she isn’t dating anyone?” She raises

an eyebrow.

Jungkook shakes his head.

“Flowers, and, I don’t know, something personal,” says his mother. “Do you know her that well?”

Jungkook thinks. “She likes to read,” he says, thinking of all the summer days spent with Taehyung reading to him at night, by the lake, by the fire.

“A book, then,” says his mother. “Nothing inappropriate, though, she won’t like that—”

_ “Mom!” _

“Alright, alright,” his mother says, laughing. “I’m going. Or you could get her a Christmas present?”

_ “Mother.” _

“I’m leaving!”

“I have to run an errand this Sunday,” he says.

“Seeing a girl?”

“Just a friend,” says Jungkook.

“For now,” says his mother. Jungkook shakes his head and fights the blush rising to his cheeks.

  
  
  


Flowers. Flowers. Flowers. Why did no one tell Jungkook how hard it was to choose flowers? Taehyung’s never mentioned flowers before. He’s going to look dumb showing up to a birthday party with a present and  _ flowers.  _ Honestly.

Besides, Taehyung is a senior and he’ll be graduating soon and Jungkook is just a junior. An awkward-as-hell-Junior, who just got his license, and almost got lost three times on the way to the park. It’s a bit cold, but it’s warmer than it should be on a winter day, and he stops off and takes the present and the godforsaken flowers out of his trunk, spotting the tell-tale balloons across the park under picnic pavilion.

He drops the present in a pile by the pavillion next to some woman who he presumes is Taehyung’s mother. He’s feeling self-conscious about it now—he couldn’t decide between the three books he was thinking about, so he bought all three.  _ Carrie, The Picture of Dorian Gray  _ (which he only got because the lady at Barnes and Noble said it was a classic but he’s regretting it now), and a nicer copy of Shakespeare's plays. He feels like an idiot. Who gets their best friend (who they happen to be very, very whipped for)  _ Shakespeare?  _ That’s not sexy, or romantic, or anything. What’s wrong with him?

“You must be Jungkook,” she says. “Taehyung has told us lots about you.”   
Jungkook holds the flowers behind his back and glances around. “Where’s Taehyung?”   
She shakes her head. “I’m not sure,” she says. “I’m sure he’ll be back soon, though. Why? Are you alright?”

Jungkook feels a familiar churning in his stomach, and makes an excuse about having to go to the bathroom, trying to keep the flowers tucked out of sight. 

He decides to actually stop by the bathroom to freshen up, and, to be honestly, keep himself from freaking out before he walks in. He doesn’t know what kind of flowers Taehyung likes—he never mentioned it, but he distinctly remembers him making a crown out of daffodils a couple times, but he checked and the store doesn’t sell those and the clerk gave him a strange look when he asked—so he just got the most expensive bouquet he could afford, along with three books that he read that year and liked, and some chocolates that he impulse-bought. Maybe if he’s too busy eating he won’t have time to yell at Jungkook for being stupid.

He doesn’t know why he’s acting so weird—it’s just  _ Taehyung.  _

Or maybe it’s because it  _ is  _ Taehyung, his best friend, who kissed him on the lake and who he hasn’t seen since. His best friend who promised him  _ something,  _ whatever that means. Maybe that’s why his whole body thrums with something like anticipation and the desire to tear his skin into little pieces. Jungkook doesn’t know. 

He hears voices along the corner as he walks around the bathroom, looking for the door—

“I’ve always liked you,” says an unfamiliar voice.

It’s Taehyung and another boy—taller than him. Handsome, Jungkook notices in an irritated kind of way.

“Minjae—” Taehyung says, and the other boy kisses him, and that’s all Jungkook needs to see.

It’s hard to describe what happens next. Jungkook doesn’t start crying, doesn’t feel like his world is falling apart, but he rather feels this sort of shift, like he’s been dropped off a cliff and he’s falling, falling, falling all the way down, shoving the flowers in the trash as he leaves and tossing the present in the backseat as he continues falling, all the way home when he locks himself in his room and tells his mom that he doesn’t feel like going to camp this year.

  
  
  


“Minjae,” says Taehyung when they break apart. Minjae looks at him. 

“I’m sorry—I don’t feel that way about you.”    


“Oh.” Minjae steps back. “Sorry.”   


“It’s just—I like someone else,” says Taehyung. He places a consoling hand on his shoulder. 

“I’m sure that he must be a hell of a guy.”

“He is,” Taehyung smiles. “He’s actually here, right now, I think.” They wander down to the pavillion, Minjae embarrassed and Taehyung searching. “That’s odd. I didn’t think he’d be late. Hey, Mom?”

His mother glances at him. 

“Have you seen Jungkook?”   


“He was just here,” she says. “He dropped off your present and then went to the bathroom, I think.”

“We were just there, though,” says Taehyung, worry twisting in his stomach. Did he say something on the phone? Do something to make him notice? Oh God, is he forcing something on his straight best friend? He  _ isn’t  _ straight, is he?

“I don’t know, honey.”

Taehyung looks around. No Jungkook in sight—no happy bunny teeth, crinkled-up eye smiles just for him. “Oh,” he says.

 

**From: Tae**

**To: Jeon Jungkook’s iPhone**

 

**12/30**

 

**3:08 p.m.**

**> >hey! Where did you go? My mom says you were here?**

**> >we’re by the pavillion, just btw**

**> >with the balloons you cant miss it**

**> >we’re cutting cake now**

**> >hey kookie i really want you here its important **

**> >i dont wanna say why but **

 

**8:30 p.m.**

**> >where did you go?? You can still come back if you have time**

 

**9:46 p.m.**

**> >we’re leaving now where are you??**

**> >i hope everything’s okay**

 

**12/31**

**> >the books you got me are awesome! Thanks so much!**

 

**01/01**

**> >happy new year kookie i hope everything’s ok**

 

**01/02**

**> >jungkook please answer me im getting worried **

 

**01/03**

**> >jungkook?**

 

**01/10**

**> >i know you’re ignoring me so i gave you space but i just thought you might want to know that i applied to the college in your city and i got in**

**> >so we can be closer next year**

**> >please respond **

 

**01/14**

**> >did you block me?**

 

**01/18**

**> >are you going to camp next year? Signups just came out**

 

**01/21**

**> >I called you and it only rang once i think that means you blocked me **

 

**01/31**

 

**To: jungkookie90197@gmail.com**

**From: kim.taehyung.13@dgschools.org**

**Hey I know you blocked me can you please just tell me what I did wrong? I’m so sorry you’re my best friend please respond**

 

**To: kim.taehyung.13@dgshools.org**

**From: noreply@google.com**

**We’re sorry, but the user you’re trying to contact does not exist.**

 

☼☼☼

VII

I see the boys of summer in their ruin

Lay the gold tithings barren,

Setting no store by harvest, freeze the soils;

There in their heat the winter floods

Of frozen loves they fetch their girls,

And drown the cargoed apples in their tides.

_ Dylan Thomas _

☼☼☼

  
  
  


"Okay, Jungkook, that is it! Do you understand me?" Yoongi squints down at him. "Do you comprehend the words that are coming out of my mouth right now?"

Jungkook flicks through TV channels aimlessly, the pixelated lights flickering on his empty eyes. "You're going to have to be more specific."

"That's the third girlfriend you've broken up with. In two weeks!" He holds up three fingers as if for emphasis. 

"Didn't think that you were the type to get involved in affairs of the heart," Jungkook deadpans and Yoongi rolls his eyes. 

"Normally, no, I wouldn't care," Yoongi says. "But because I decided, hey, let's let this dumb freshman, who's older brother was vaguely nice to me when I was a freshman, stay with me, now I have to deal with them!" Yoongi's voice is rising. "Do you know I've just started carrying tissues? I jump now when girls look at me or walk towards me because I'm worried that, oh fuck, there's one of Kook's exes, here to cry on my shoulder and ask if you ever really liked her. My shoulder is permanently damp, Jungkook, I swear! Half of the population has become an imminent threat to me!"

"Just tell her that I never really liked her," Jungkook says, and realizes how harsh the words sound when they come out of his mouth. Damn. When did he get so bitter?

Well, he has an idea. 

"Which one? There are dozens."

"All of them." Jungkook flips to a sitcom. "There's nothing good on."

"How can't you like any of them?" Yoongi asks. "What about that girl Momo? She was really sweet."

"Yeah, but she kept trying to kiss me," Jungkook says. 

"That's generally what people do when they're in a relationship, Jungkook."

"No . . . like gross, sappy, romantic stuff," Jungkook says. "Wanted to hold hands in public."

"I'm sorry," Yoongi says bitingly. "I forgot that I'm talking to Jungkook—Straight Fuckboy2000."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"How long is the longest relationship you've had?"

"Easy," Jungkook says. "A month."

"Are you talking about Wheein? Because she was in China for three out of four weeks and you broke up two days after she got back."

"Just . . . don't talk to them," says Jungkook. "Walk away."

"That's low, Jungkook," says Yoongi. "Even for you."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Jungkook asks. "I'm doing them a favor, breaking up with them. You wouldn't understand."

"Oh, please, Jungkook, in all of your college freshman wisdom," says Yoongi. "Enlighten me on your thought process here. What does Mighty Jungkook think he's doing by dropping these girls after a week?"

"I can tell if I'm going to like somebody after a week," Jungkook says. "I don't feel . . . anything towards them, so I tell them, and then I drop it. Simple."

"God, Jungkook," Yoongi says. "If you weren't so adamantly against it, I'd say that you were gay, but since you are, maybe you're just, like, incapable of feelings."

"I'm capable of feelings," says Jungkook, a little hurt. Because he is. A little too capable, but that's behind him. 

"Sure, Jungkook," says Yoongi. "I'm going to go hang with Hobi for awhile, because I can't stay here with you and your heterosexual bullshit. Goodnight!"

And he leaves Jungkook alone, and lonely but not just for Yoongi's absence. He does feel a little bad, since Yoongi  _ did  _ offer to let him room with him when his freshman dorm flooded but . . . he’s too sober for this shit.

He glances around the room and his gaze lands on Yoongi's bed, where he knows he has a bottle of whiskey stored.

"Thanks, Yoongi," he mutters, taking it and downing it. 

  
  
  


It was only a matter of time, Jungkook supposes, until his terrible relationships and borderline alcoholism caught up to him. He didn’t think, however, that it would come in the form of his mother, yelling at him on the phone. 

“I saw your credit card statements,” the conversation begins, and goes downhill from there. 

So Jungkook’s been consuming approximately a bottle of whiskey and/or vodka per week. That’s not very much in the grand scheme of things, and he found an ABC store that’s dirt cheap, but that doesn’t matter to his mother, who is currently freaking out. 

“You’re making that money back,” she says. 

“Mom—it’s my—”

“In fact, I got you a job.”   


Jungkook leans back into the couch and groans. McDonalds isn’t that bad, in the grand scheme of things. 

“Do you remember that summer camp that you used to go to?”

Jungkook sits up. “No. Mom, no.”

“I filled out your application and they agreed to let you on late,” she says. “Don’t mess it up.”   


She hangs up the phone with a  _ click  _ and Jungkook sinks back into sofa. 

He’s done his best to just forget about Taehyung—he was a mistake, a glitch in the system. He was an idiot to think that his best friend would ever—could ever—like him back, and besides, Jeon Jungkook is as straight as an arrow. 

There have been a couple times . . . when he thought he saw him hurrying across campus, the familiar tan of his skin, the slope of his nose. But he couldn’t have seen him. Taehyung lives hours away. 

Every time that he thinks he sees a ghost of his old best friend, he runs away anyway. He doesn’t know why. It’s just an instinct at this point; his feelings for Taehyung were just a hormonal teenager too confused about what he wanted to know that he wasn’t actually in love with his best friend.

He probably won’t even see Taehyung at the camp, so it’s a non-issue. The fact that he’ll be a lifeguard at the lake where he swam and listened to Taehyung read and kissed him so many nights ago is irrelevant. Jeon Jungkook is over it. 

Right?

  
  


Jungkook is late. And it's not his fault.

Granted, it isn't entirely his fault. Yoongi really wanted to get wasted (or, more accurately, he was hoping that he and a certain cute sophomore from one year down could get wasted together and he's using Jungkook as an unwilling wingman), and Jungkook had no choice but to match him shot for shot or face his friend's . . . displeasure. Judging by the sounds the fact that he woke up outside his dorm room, a blanket curled around his shoulders, and the fact that he's pretty sure he has hazy memories of one Jung Hoseok exiting his dorm room, considering letting him in, and then deciding that screw it, the dumb freshman is too out of it to reason with. 

Damn that Jung Hoseok. 

So now, here he is, driving, smelling of alcohol and dorm room floor (he didn't have time to change, seeing as how he's already an hour late) and probably death, and he just hopes that somebody else will be late. They're college students, right? They can't expect for them to all be on time.

Turns out, that's wrong. He pulls up in the staff parking lot and can see everyone heading back to their cabins, probably to get ready for dinner, and yeah, this is most definitely not a great start to what he's suspecting will be the worst . . . eight weeks or so? 

"Oh, hey!" 

That voice is familiar and he feels a familiar prickle up his shoulders, a familiar tenseness creeping into his bones, so he lowers his gaze and keeps his back to the speaker.

"Are you a counselor too?" the stranger—not a stranger, he knows, but he likes to pretend—asks, and Jungkook nods, still turned away.

"Oh, cool! I'm late too." Jungkook finally looks at him—and—

Kim Taehyung. Two years older than he saw him last, and every bit as stunning—taller. A lot taller, maybe the same height as he is, or maybe more by a centimeter. He's tanner than he remembers, hair streaked with brunet from time spent out in the sun. He's glowing, Jungkook realizes, like all those days spent by the lake under the sun. Kim Taehyung is still the same as all of his summers—sun-soaked, lazy days and cold nights spent huddled together with only each other and Taehyung’s voice to keep them warm, and he’s not ready for this. He thought he was, but he’ll never be ready for this. 

"I was just getting this inhaler for—" he stutters when his eyes reach Jungkook's face. "Oh."

Jungkook takes one look at Taehyung; one look at the boy that grabbed him by the shoulder and declared that they were friends, the boy who he . . . well, he has  _ feelings  _ for, the boy who he ran away from and cut off all contact from, and . . . he runs. 

And he’s a good sprinter, ask anybody. He makes it to the top of the hill where the admissions is, where he discovers that everyone has left, including whoever was supposed to sign him in. He frowns, and hears a voice call out behind him, “Looking for something?”   


Jungkook frowns and sees Taehyung, panting slightly. “You run quickly.”   


“It’s something you have to learn when you’re in a summer camp filled with little brats,” Taehyung shrugs. He narrows his eyes. “Why did you run?”   


“Just, uh, late,” he says. “Wanted to get there quickly.”   


“Well, unlike you, I was actually  _ on time,”  _ says Taehyung. “So I know where we’re supposed to be. But I drove an hour down the road to catch a camper’s mom because he forgot his inhaler.”

“Oh,” says Jungkook.    


“So why are you late?”

“Um,” says Jungkook, not wanting to explain the real reason because of course Taehyung would go and be a saint like that. “Traffic.”

Taehyung raises an eyebrow, but doesn't say anything. “Everyone will be eating right now,” he says. “We can find them there. Follow me.”

“I know the way,” says Jungkook, but even so he’s not going to run away again so he settles for walking five feet across from Taehyung. 

“So,” says Taehyung. 

Jungkook grunts. He is not ready to have this conversation. 

“Did you just lose my number or something?”

Forget not running again. Jungkook sprints all the way to the dining hall. 

  
  
  


The camp manager is nice, younger than Jungkook expected, and a total  _ menace.  _ A menace with dimples, no less. Fuck him. 

“Jeon Jungkook,” he says, checking him off. “You’re in Cabin 3 with Kim Taehyung, I believe.”

Comically, Taehyung arrives at that moment, where he’s attacked by a screaming blond. 

“Jimin,  _ get off!”  _ he hisses, shoving him away affectionately. Jungkook feels his chest tighten. Taehyung looks at the camp manager and holds up the inhaler.

“Thanks, Taehyung, you’re a lifesaver,” says the manager. “Have you met your bunkmate?”   


Taehyung slowly turns to Jungkook and shakes his head. Jungkook nods, surprised that he’s finding something to agree with him on. He doesn’t want to be in his former best friend’s cabin any more than Taehyung does. He’d rather sleep in the woods. 

“There has to be a mistake,” he says, shaking his head. “I wanted to be with Jimin—”

The blond boy looks at Taehyung and pouts. “Yeah, Namjoon, really—”   
“I thought it was best after interviewing you that you two, ehem, were seperated for a while,” says Namjoon. 

“Can I switch bunkmates with him at least, though?” asks Taehyung. 

“Taehyung, you just  _ met  _ Jungkook that’s rude,” says Namjoon, tucking a pen behind his ear. 

“Actually—” says Jungkook, but Namjoon just glares at him. 

“Right,” says Jungkook.    


Jimin holds onto Taehyung and Jungkook swallows. He shouldn’t feel the need to shove Jimin off, he shouldn’t feel the urge to pick all his own skin off out of irritation, but he does.

He shouldn’t be looking at Taehyung all these years later and still feel that urge of  _ want want want,  _ but he does. 

“Is he your boyfriend now?” he asks lowly. 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” asks Taehyung, malice cutting into his voice. Jungkook’s never heard that before. Not directed at him. 

It shouldn’t hurt this much. Not so many years later. 

But it does. 

  
  
  


“Lifeguarding is easy,” says one of the female counselors, Lisa, holding a float during lake time. “Just make sure the little squirts don’t drown.”

Jungkook settles down by the lake and kicks his legs back and forth. “Fine,” he says. 

“You good?” asks Lisa. 

Jungkook glances across the lake to where Taehyung is laying in the sand, letting some kids bury him, throwing his head back and laughing. He glows even brighter under the sun. 

“Fine,” he says. “Just bored.”

Lisa’s mouth quirks up into a smile. “I think I can fix that.”

  
  
  


Jungkook likes Lisa. There are various reasons; she's a genuinely kind, bubbly person, she seems to enjoy his company, a good sense of humor, and she's packed an entire duffel bag of tequila.

"This is the shit," he says that night when they're alone in the boathouse, where she has stocked all of the tequila. Jungkook isn’t sure how she got it all in here without being noticed, hidden behind old life jackets, but he doesn’t really care. 

Lisa takes the bottle from him and turns it upside down in her mouth. "Cost me a fuckton, though."

"Yeah," says Jungkook. They're sitting on the bed of life jackets, alone, trading sips of alcohol, and then it hits him. "Lisa?"

"Hm?"

"You don't want to fuck me, do you?"

"What the fuck kinda question is that?"

Jungkook wishes that he was just being vain or conceited; he really does. But he's not stupid enough to miss the intimacy of this situation, is he? Even if he doesn't want it . . . even if he's never really wanted it . . .

"No, no, no, I don't want to—"

Lisa just laughs at him. "Hate to disappoint, but I'm, like, super gay, dude."

"Oh," Jungkook says, and he doesn't know why but he's relieved. Should he be relieved? That an obviously attractive, supposedly single person of the opposite gender is completely uninterested in him, and never will be? Maybe. "I was just making sure."

“I have a girlfriend,” she says. 

“Who?”   
“Jisoo,” she says, taking a sip. 

“Oh, she’s cute,” Jungkook says, remembering her. Come to think of it, she and Lisa do hang around each other a lot and he saw her kiss her on the cheek but thought nothing of it. “Sorry.”

"Don't worry about it," says Lisa, taking another sip of tequila. "What about you?"

"What about me?"

"I don't know. Sometimes I get a vibe, you know."

"From me?" Jungkook frowns. "I don't  _ act _ gay."

"It's not like that," says Lisa. "I don't know. So, Kinsey 1, I guess?"

"Kinsey 1 all the way," Jungkook sighs.

Lisa frowns. “You don’t  _ sound  _ thrilled about your prospective heterosexuality,” she says, pouring herself a new glass in a solo cup. “You good, man?”   


“Fine,” Jungkook bites. “More alcohol.”

  
  
  


When Jungkook shows up late Taehyung glares at him. 

“You missed curfew,” he says, sitting up in his bed. He’s made it up with blankets and everything—Jungkook had just run up and tossed his bag on the mattress. Counselors get twin beds with lumpy mattresses instead of rubber-mattressed bunk beds.

Jungkook just shrugs. “Since when did that ever matter to you?”

“Look, Jungkook,” says Taehyung, and the way that he says his name hurts. Not  _ Kookie  _ or  _ Jungkookie.  _ Jungkook, spat out like a dirty word. “Let’s just stay out of each other’s way, okay?”

Jungkook shrugs. “Fine by me.”

“And try to be civil in front of the campers,” says Taehyung. 

When Jungkook  _ had  _ met his cabin, earlier, his first thought was  _ ‘ew, elementary schoolers’ _ . They look around the ages of eight to ten, and although they did poke some questions around him being late, they mostly accepted that Counselor Jungkook wasn’t going to talk very much and left him alone. 

Taehyung, of course, is amazing with the campers, giving piggy-back rides and listening to their stories like he actually cares—which he probably does. It’s confusing—Jungkook is trying really, really hard to be caught between anger at the boy who lied to him about his feelings and apathy about him in general, but Kim Taehyung seems, at least when he’s around the kids, to be a pretty exceptional human being. Which is confusing for Jungkook in many ways.

The boy who Taehyung drove an hour to fetch an inhaler for—Jiho—adores him most of all, clambering for piggy back rides and hanging onto his every word, insisting on sitting at his table during dinner. Jungkook sits as far away from Taehyung as he can.

“I’m civil,” says Jungkook. 

“Keep it that way,” says Taehyung, giving him one last disparaging look before rolling over and falling asleep.

  
  
  


The next week passes by without much fanfare. The boys in his cabin are, generally, loud, obnoxious, and way too full of energy, with the possible exception of Jiho who is quiet and clings to Taehyung most times. Jungkook tells himself that it isn’t familiar, the way that he relies on him. He doesn’t know what to tell himself anymore.

For the most part, the two of them honor their promise of “staying out of each others way”. He doesn’t know if the camper have noticed that they exchange maybe five words in a single conversation, always out of necessity. They haven’t mentioned it to anyone, and Jungkook just hopes no one—ehem, Namjoon—finds out. Namjoon, for all of his good qualities, possesses the major character flaw that he believes they should all be friends and bong and sing Kumbaya around the fire, and Jungkook knows that that just isn’t going to happen for him and Taehyung. 

As for Jungkook, he doesn’t know how to act around Taehyung. How do you act around yoru former best riend who you blocked and ignored after they cheated on something that you’re not even sure was a relationship? Not that he cares; Jeon Jungkook is straight.

Taehyung is cool, collected—always—but warm around the campers, around that Jimin who he always sits and eats with. Jungkook knows that they’re dating now—it’s obvious from the way that they cling to each other—and he tells himself that he doesn’t care.Instead, he’s gone back to his regular policy of keeping his head down and not talking to anyone at all—except for Lisa, who at this point has become a regular drinking buddy.

“Why don’t you ever bring anyone else?” he asks.

“Don’t care to,” Lisa grins. “You’re more fun.” She shakes her head. “And Wang would go through all of my alcohol like  _ that. _ ”

“What about your girlfriend? Jisoo?”

Lisa drains the bottle. “She doesn’t like it,” she says. “Lucky for me, you do.”

The only real high point of the week is Saturday, when Yoongi’s car pulls into the staff parking lot. Granted, Jungkook doesn’t witness this; instead, Yoongi wanders around the camp for a few minutes, looking confused and out of place in a leather jacket and skinny jeans until he finally shows up in teh dining hall.

“Yoongi!” Jungkook yells when he sees him, making his way over and dumping his plate in the sink. “You came to visit?”   
“Just wanted to make sure that you hadn’t gotten lost in the woods,” says Yoongi, shoving a hard drawstring back in his direction. 

Jungkook opens it and sees multiple bottles, then zips it up just as quickly. 

"Is the food here any good?" asks Yoongi, looking around curiously. 

"Not really," says Jungkook, wrinkling his nose. 

"Figures," says Yoongi. "You're paying for that, by the way."

"Thanks."

"And don't think I don't know that you stole my whiskey," he adds. "You're paying for that too. I'll take it off your credit card."

"Wait—how do you even know what my credit card number is?

Yoongi looks him up and down. "Um. Duh." He sighs. "Take that and make some friends, alright?"

"You're leaving already?"

"It's a long drive and I have a date tonight," says Yoongi, spinning on his heel and walking away. "I just wanted to make sure you hadn't died."

"Wait, who is it?" Jungkook calls after him. "Is it Hoseok?"

Yoongi doesn't respond, but flips him the middle finger. Jungkook hears several laughs behind him and feels a sudden headache coming on. He feels someone come up behind him and turns, seeing Jackson Wang's telltale grin. 

"So," he drawls. "What's in the bag?"

  
  
  
  


Lisa and Taehyung are escorting two campers back from the nurse after they mistakenly assumed they could eat some of the plants in the forest. Luckily, it was nothing poisonous, but that doesn't mean that Jin, the camp nurse, didn't have a freakout and lecture them for ten solid minutes. Lisa spots a stranger—definetely not a camp counselor, not in a leather jacekt—walking back from what looks like the dining hall and she frowns. 

"Can I help you?" she asks. 

"I'm just heading back to get my car," says the stranger.

"Adults not affiliated with the camp aren't allowed without signing in," says Taehyung, putting a hand on his camper's shoulder. "We have kids here."

"I was just visiting my friend," says the stranger. "He's a counselor—you know Jeon Jungkook?"

Taehyung's jaw tigthens but Lisa's face breaks out into a smile. 

"Yeah!" she says. "He's my friend. I'm Lisa."

"Yoongi," says the stranger. "So . . . friend?"

Lisa frowns. "Yeah. Why?"

"Jungkook has a habit of—" he glances at the campers "serial dating girls. I swear he does it to himself. He can't hold down a relationship to save his life. Just be careful, alright?"

And with that he walks off, leaving Lisa confused and Taehyung staring straight ahead. 

"That was weird," she says. 

"Yeah," says Taehyung. "Weird."

  
  
  
  


Within two hours Jackson Wang somehow spreads the knowledge that Jeon Jungkook has come into a large amount of alcohol and has organized a counselors-only bonfire, once all the campers are put to sleep, of course. He even gets Lisa to donate a couple bottles of tequila. 

Yoongi was thorough; Jungkook will give him that much. Tequila, whiskey, vodka. The counselors are appreciative and Jungkook isn’t overly fond of Jackson Wang, but he has to give it to him, he knows how to build a bonfire.

Jungkook doesn’t know why, but he always thought of campfires as soft things, the light of the skies, the soothing crackle of twigs, and maybe the warmth of somebody beside him . . .

Jimin did end up dragging Taehyung to the fire, but he doesn’t look overly thrilled to be there. They’re dating; they have to be judging by how close they’re sitting, how comfortable they are together. He tells himself that he doesn’t care. It doesn’t help that Jimin is just wearing his underwear, having taking a dare to strip down, and it doesn’t help that he’s so fit. Jungkook catches himself comparing. He wishes that he didn’t, and takes another shot.

“So,” says Jackson, taking a shot of vodka. “What’s up first?”

“What do you mean?” asks Jungkook. 

“Truth or dare!” yells Lisa from where she and Jisoo are tangled together on the ground. Jisoo kisses her on the cheek.

“Hey, let’s keep the PDA to a minimum until we’re all wasted, eh?” asks Yugyeom. Lisa flips him off and kisses Jisoo on the lips, and Jungkook finds himself laughing in spite of himself. 

“Right,” says Jackson. “Truth or dare.”   
Jungkook glances at Taehyung again and drains the bottle of whiskey that’s passed to him. 

Bottles begin to pile up around his feet as his fellow counselors tell embarassing stories (he  _ really  _ didn’t need to know that much about Jackson Wang’s first time), strip, sing terrible 2000s pop songs at the top of their lungs while being recorded, and do other various acts that Jungkook is happy to stay out of. He notices that Taehyung is staying out of it too, for the most part, but he thinks he sees a faint blush of red settle over his features after a while. He’s on his way to drunk. Jungkook, on the other hand, is already there.

He finds himself staring in his direction more and more often. At first, he tells himself it’s simple curiosity. Animosity. But he’s too drunk to lie to himself anymore and knows that it’s something more; he  _ wants. _ He wants to be the one tangled up around him under the stars. He wants to catch fireflies and sneak down to the lake in the middle of the night like they were kids. He  _ wants wants wants  _ and he knows that he’ll never have him, so he’ll content imself with looking in his direction. 

He’s been avoiding his gaze for so long now, but now that he can look at him he notices the differences. His jawline is sharper now, his hair shorter and not as long and floppy as when they were kids, and he doesn’t know how to describe it but he seems to have grown into his features. He looks like an adult, and Jungkook still feels like a stupid kid, clutching onto a bottle and still with this hopeless crush on his best friend. 

Not his best friend anymore. All Jungkook knows it that he wants to be again; he just wants to be touched by him again. His skin is starved for it. He’s had so many people try to touch him, try to kiss him and love him, but it’s never measured up, not really. Because he’s always been waiting,  _ wanting  _ for the boy who he dragged out of the lake so many years ago . . .

“What about you, Jungkook?”

Lisa looks at him curiously, twirling the bottle around in her hand, the fire glinting off the glass, startling him out of his thoughts. “Truth or dare?”

“Uh, truth,” Jungkook coughs.

“He said dare!” Lisa cheers loudly. The other counselors whoop, all attention fixated on him. Taehyung makes a point of looking interested in the stars, pointing out a particularly bright one to Jimin, who doesn’t pay attention to him.

“That’s not—”

“I wanna go,” says Yugyeom. He thinks. “I dare you to streak.” Jungkook’s eyes widen almost comically.

“There are kids here, man, c’mon,” says Jin, shaking his head.

“They’re all asleep,” Yugyeom points out.

“Still,” says Jisoo, knocking back what looks like a flask of whiskey. “It’s not like any of us want to see Jeon’s pale ass anyway. Boring.”

“Have him make out with someone,” suggests Jackson, tilting his head.

“What the fuck is this, middle school?” asks Taehyung suddenly, jolting at Jackson’s comment like his soul had just returned to his body. “Are we going to play seven minutes in heaven in the closet?” He takes a hit of tequila.

“Yeah, actually,” says Jackson. “That sounds like a good idea. Jeon, seven minutes in heaven, your choice.”

“I don’t want to—” Jungkook sputters.

“You have to choose,” Jackson grins.

“Fucking menace,” grins Yugyeom.

“Uh, Lisa,” Jungkook’s brain short-circuits. Jisoo glares at him.

“The fuck? No. I’m gay, dude,” says Lisa. “We had an entire conversation about this. I have a girlfriend.”

“Well I don’t want to pick someone who actually  _ wants _ to,” Jungkook tries to explain, but Jackson just rolls his eyes. Jisoo still . . . well, she isn’t thrilled with him, which makes him feel a bit bad because she’s one of the most genuinely nice human beings he’s ever met. But she also happens to be genuinely terrifying when she’s angry, despite being so much shorter than him. Oops.

“This is taking too long,” says Jackson. “How about Taehyung? He’s the one who suggested it in the first place.”

Taehyung’s eyes widen and he shakes his head. Jungkook sputters, avoiding his eyes. 

“Why not?” asks Jackson. 

“Taehyung has a boyfriend,” Jungkook says.

“He does?” asks Jackson. The others peer at him questioningly.

“No, I don’t,” says Taehyung quietly. Jimin frowns.

“You didn’t tell me?” Jimin asks, looking hurt.

“He thought it was yo—” Taehyung tries to explain, and Jimin turns to Jungkook, grinning a bit, clearly drunk.

“You thought we were dating?” he asks, slinging an arm around Taehyung. 

Jungkook tilts his head, because even in his drunken stupor he feels like something isn’t right. “Taehyung said—”

“I never said anything,” Taehyung says, finally looking at him. Jungkook sees the red coloring his features now—Taehyung is drunk, no doubt. “You assumed. Like you always fucking do.”

“The fuck is that supposed to mean?” Jungkook stands up, angry suddenly but he doesn’t feel like it’s directed at Taehyung.

“I don’t know,” says Taehyung. “Why don’t you assume that too?”

“Do you have something to say to me—”

“Okay,” Jackson cuts in. “This is taking too long—Jungkook, why don’t you just make out with Rose?”

“I don’t want to make out with her,” Jungkook snaps. “I don’t want to make out with any girls!”

There’s a collective silence and Jungkook takes a step back when he realizes what he just said.

“I—” he says. “I meant right now, not like—” He glances around the campfire. “—I have to go.”

And so, for the—well, he doesn’t know what time it is, but it’s probably in the double digits—time that summer, he runs from his problems.

The campfire crackles in the absence of anyone saying anything, and Lisa stands up.

“I’m gonna go—check on that,” she says, before taking off.

Taehyung sinks into his chair. “Fucking—”

“What’s going on between you two?” Jimin asks quietly, not sounding like he expects a response. “What happened?”

Taehyung shakes his head. “Fuck if I know.”

  
  


Jungkook finds refuge under a tree. A large tree. He likes trees, he supposes. He’s missed the forest after all these years in the city, more than he likes to admit. And he’s missed something other than the forest—missed a wide smile that will never come for him again. 

“You wanna tell me what that was about?” 

Jungkook looks up and sees Lisa stumbling through the darkness, before finally crouching in front of him.

“I don’t know,” says Jungkook. “You know, before, when I said I didn’t want to—”

“Jungkook,” says Lisa, and she sounds very tired. “Please don’t lie to me.”

“It doesn’t mean anything,” he says, tucking his head to his knees. “Just not  _ right now. _ ”

“You know, Yoongi and I talked when he came to visit.”   
Jungkook lifts his head up. “You did?”   
“Yeah,” Lisa shrugs. “I think he thought that we were—I don’t know,  _ something,  _ and he talked about how you always sabotage your relationships.”

“It’s not my fault that they never work out—”

“Jungkook,” says Lisa. “Just,  _ please.  _ Be honest with me right now. You’re too drunk to lie and I’m too sober to believe you.”

Jungkook stares at her for a few moments.

“When we were kids,” he says quietly. “I think I loved him.”

Lisa nods, her face expressionless, waiting for him to continue. 

"I think I still love him," he says at last, and Lisa stares at him.

"Not gay, huh?" she says at last. 

"I know," he says. "Not for long, though. 'Cause you don't fall in love with your best friend. Not even my best friend anymore. Cause that's dumb and I'm not dumb."

"No. You just drank probably an entire gallon of collective alcohol with a content of 40% when you have morning duty tomorrow. That's smart."

"I can't—I can't love him—"

"Okay, you drunk idiot." Lisa sits in front of him and holds his face up in her hand, squeezing hard. "Mr. "I'm Not Gay". I've had to listen to you mope over him, so you're going to me now, alright?"

Jungkook blinks and slurs something.

"Good," says Lisa. "First of all: you cannot help who you love. Do you understand, you idiot?”   


“Hurtful.”   


“Right,” says Lisa. “Do you want to know how I knew I was gay?”   


Jungkook frowns. “Said it was personal.”   


“Well, you’re clearly drunk and you probably won’t remember this anyway,” says Lisa. “I had this friend, right? Best friend. Known each other since we were kids. Our moms wanted us to get married and all that jazz, right?”

“And he was an asshole?”   


“No,” Lisa sighs. “He was actually . . . he was actually really sweet. I loved that boy as much as I could love any boy. So we started dating our junior year of high school ‘cause we thought it would make sense. And no matter what I did . . . I couldn’t love him, Kook. No matter how much—he was my best friend. I told him everything. And I couldn’t make myself love him.”

“I don’t know,” Jungkook shakes his head. “How do I just go up to someone and say that  _ ‘hey, we used to be best friends, but I was an idiot and I’m also totally in love with you haha no big deal’?”  _

“That sounds like a good start.”

“Ha-ha.”   


“Taehyung’s a good guy—”   


“He’s pissed as fuck at me,” Jungkook shakes his head. “Should be.”   


“Maybe,” says Lisa. “But he couldn’t hate you if he didn’t still love you a bit.”   


“He can’t,” Jungkook shakes his head. “He can’t love someone like me.”   


“Aw, don’t get all emo and shit,” Lisa says. “Or I’ll cut off your tequila allowance!”

“You wouldn’t!”   


Lisa laughs. “I would,” she says softly. “You’re gonna be okay, alright, Jungkook?”   


“Alright,” says Jungkook. “And you? You found someone to love?”   


Lisa smiles softly. “Jisoo,” she says, unable to stop herself from smiling as she says the word.    


“Love her?”   


Lisa shakes her head. 

“So much.”

  
  
  


“Morning duty,” Lisa shows up at his cabin, grinning. Jungkook rolls off his bunk and groans. “You’re worse than my campers, honestly.” 

“They’re not hungover,” says Jungkook. 

“And who’s fault is that?”

Jungkook glances at Taehyung’s sleeping form and doesn’t say anything. “I didn’t think you had morning rounds,” he says. 

“I don’t,” says Lisa. She sighs. “But seeing as how I am an absolute saint—I want that in writing, by the way—I thought that I’d come with you. To talk.”

Jungkook shakes his head and hops out of bed, throwing on some shoes. “Are you even supposed to be in the boys cabin?”

“Technically no,” says Lisa. “But I think the situation between you and me is pretty low-risk.”

“What do you mean by that?” he asks, combing his hair through his fingers and pulling on a jacket. It’s not as bad as it could be. 

“I’m gay with a girlfriend and you’re . . . something, and in love with your best friend,” says Lisa.

“It’s too early for this shit,” Jungkook says, covering his ears and shepherding her out. “And he’s not my best friend anymore. Haven’t you noticed that he hates my guts?”

“I don’t think he hates you,” says Lisa. “I don’t think he hates anyone.”

“Whatever,” says Jungkook. “Can we leave?”

“Fine.” Lisa stalks off, Jungkook following after, slamming the door behind him. 

Taehyung lifts his head up and groans, checking the time, wondering what kind of dream he just had when Lisa Manoban said that Jeon Jungkook was in love with him. 

  
  
  


“It’s not love,” says Jungkook. “I was drunk, and we all say stupid shit while we’re drunk.”

“Have you ever heard the saying that what was done while drunk was thought while sober?”

“No, I haven’t,” says Jungkook pointedly. 

“Just saying,” says Lisa. “Also, you have a legit alcohol problem so I’m cutting you off until you get your shit together.”

Jungkook grunts.

“No offense.” Lisa sighs. “I used to, too.”

Jungkook glances at her. “What helped?”

“Being honest,” says Lisa. “What happened between you two?”

Jungkook kicks a rock. “I don’t know,” he says. “We kissed at camp and I thought it meant something—he said it meant something—but then he invited me to his birthday party and . . . I saw him kissing another guy.”

“Oof,” says Lisa. Jungkook glares at her.

“I don’t know what else to say,” she says. “That’s rough.” She pauses. “Doesn’t sound like him, though. Our Taehyung?”

“Yeah, our Taehyung,” says Jungkook. 

“I was at this camp, too, you know,” she says. 

“Oh,” says Jungkook. “Sorry.”

“For what?”

“Not noticing you, I guess,” he says. 

“Don’t worry,” says Lisa. “It was a big camp, and I remember you two. Kind of, at least. Whenever I saw you, you two had eyes only for each other.”

“Then how do you know anything about him?”

Lisa shrugs. “I don’t really,” she says. “I just remember crying one time and he tried to help me.”

“Why were you crying?”

“Doesn’t matter now,” says Lisa coolly. “Point is that I felt bad and he wanted to help. He’s a good person.”

“Yeah, he just hates me now.” Jungkook sighs. “Can’t say I blame him.”

“What did you do?”

“I kind of . . . blocked him,” Jungkook says tightly. “On everything.”

“Jeon Jungkook!” Lisa whacks him across the head. For someone so small in comparison to him, she’s surprisingly strong. “What the fuck?”

“I freaked, okay?” Jungkook says. “I was a dumb sixteen-year-old.”

“And now you’re a dumb eighteen-year-old,” says Lisa. “God. Okay, he’s going to be so mad at me for tell you this, but he’s kind of started an impromptu book club on Tuesday nights.”

“What?” He means to sound confused, but it comes out more strangled. Lisa looks at him disparagingly. 

“Don’t give me that look, you whipped motherfucker” she says. “If you wanted him you shouldn’t have ghosted him.” She sighs. “It started because we caught him reading some fancy book at dinner and we all made fun of him for it.”

“What book?” he asks absent-mindedly. 

“I don’t know, some fucking old boring thing,” she says. “We all bought copies, but w’re really just there to drink cheap beer.” She pauses. “Pictures of Dorian Gray, or something like that?”

  
  
  


Jungkook borrows the camp van—illegally—and drives to the nearest bookstore to buy a copy. The next Tueday night he walks into the dining hall. 10:30, just like Lisa told him. 

“Hi,” he says. Some of the counselors are sitting around, just as Lisa explained, on the floor or sprawled across tables. Taehyung is sitting down while Jimin runs little braids through his hair, Lisa and Jisoo have appropriated two chairs and are somehow sharing them both. Namjoon is nowhere to be seen—Jungkook suspects that he knows about it, but he’s ignoring it—but Jin, the camp nurse, is sitting with a copy propped in his hands, seemingly the only one who is actually interested in reading the book. 

“Oh,” says Taehyung when he walks in. 

“Hi, Jungkook!” says Lisa cheerfully. Jisoo regards him a little coolly, but doesn’t say anything. 

“This is book club,” says Taehyung. “Did you bring a book?”

Jungkook holds up a copy. 

“Well, then you could explain what happens in Chapter Seven,” says Taehyung. 

Jungkook, who Sparknote-ed the entire book before entering, frowns. “Um,” he says. “So Sibyl, right, there’s a play and she performs really badly and—”

“Tae, you’re not going to make him recite it word-for-word,” says Jimin. He shakes his head and gestures to Jungkook. “Sit down and grab a beer.”

Jungkook nods and sits. 

“Right,” says Jimin. “Who’s got the worst camper story of the week?”

“Half of the girls in my cabin didn’t wash their legs after hiking and they all have poison ivy,” says Jisoo. 

Jin shakes his head. “I have to deal with that,” he says, swirling his drink around. “What about the kid who thinks he has hypothermia because he jumped in the lake and it was cold?”

The others nod sympathetically. 

Jungkook grabs a beer and finds himself relaxing. He’s not getting drunk—Lisa is making sure of that, from the look she’s giving him every time he takes a sip—but it’s not an unpleasant feeling. The other counselors aren’t that bad, he decides after some consideration, although some of the others (see: Jackson and Yugyeom) might be a little obnoxious while drunk. 

When the others are talking, Taehyung makes his way over to Jungkook. 

“Why are you doing this?” he asks quietly. 

“What do you mean?”

“What happened to ‘staying out of each others way’?” Taehyung asks. 

“I like books, I like beer,” says Jungkook, taking a sip. “Do you not want me here?”

Taehyung tilts his head but says nothing. 

“I want to try to be . . . civil,” says Jungkook. “Friends.”

Taehyung studies him. “We can try,” he says at last, before turning back to the rest of the group.

"I got you that book," says Jungkook quietly. Taehyung looks at him again. 

"What?"

"Nothing," he says. Taehyung looks him up and down. 

"It's a good book," he says.

  
  
  


“Jungkook!” 

Jiho, the camper with an inhaler who’s too short for his age and doesn’t run quickly enough, is staring at him. 

“Aren’t you supposed to be playing capture the flag?” asks Jungkook. Field duty is probably one of his favorites; not because he enjoys it, but because the kids can run around while he stands with the other counselors on the presumed duty of being a referee and tries to get a signal to his phone. Two bars. 

“I’m breathing really hard,” he says. “Can I stand by you?”

“Fine by me,” says Jungkook. As long as the kid doesn’t get in the way of his cell phone time. He glances around, looking for Taehyung, as he’s the kid’s normal companion, but he’s in the middle of capture the flag, running around right in the thick of it. Figures. 

Jiho watches the other boys wistfully. 

“Why don’t you want to play?” he asks. 

“I’m not good at it,” says Jiho quietly. “I can’t run very fast.”

“What’s the score?” 

“Tied. 3-3.”

Jungkook looks over across the field. “Okay,” he says, grabbing Jiho by the arm gently and steering him onto the field. “I’m playing now. Here’s what we’re gonna do . . .”

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


It’s a simple maneuver, really—Jungkook’s watched enough football with Yoongi that it makes sense. Jiho waits by the line while Jungkook grabs the ball and throws it to him—Jiho, mercifully, doesn’t drop it—and he sprints ten feet to the goal. But Jiho scoring the final point that brings Cabin 3 to the lead still sends the boys into a frenzy, whooping and cheering around the smaller boy who just grins at them. Jungkook lifts him up onto his shoulders and he sees Jiho laugh. 

“Breathing good?” he asks. 

Jiho gives him a thumbs up and the other boys reach up to give him high-fives.

Jungkook thinks that he sees Taehyung watching him from across the field, an odd expression on his face, like he’s contemplating something. But then he sees Jungkook looking and he turns away.

  
  
  
  
  


Jungkook wakes up to the door slamming shut. He sits up and fumbles around, finding Taehyung’s bunk empty. 

He shouldn’t follow him . . .

He expects him to head over to Jimin’s cabin; he doesn’t. Instead, he goes down the path that Jungkook knows so well, all the way to the docks, strips off his shirt, and dives into the lake.

The lake never really changes. It’s odd. So many years and so many missteps, but this could be the night that Taehyung kissed him if he squints his eyes enough. If he ignores all the twisted weeds that have grown up in between them all these years later.

He watches Taehyung for a little bit—just making laps around the pool. He’s gotten stronger, Jungkook notices. More assured in his own skin. Or maybe it's just that he's grown up, and Jungkook still feels like a little kid. A little kid with a drinking problem, but a little kid nonetheless.

“Are you sure you should be in there alone?” he calls out at last, feeling a bit like a stalker.

Taehyung startles, then looks at him. “What are you doing here?”

“I saw you leaving,” says Jungkook. He makes his way down to the dock and stands in front of him. “Should you really be swimming alone? With your asthma?”

“It’s gotten a lot better,” says Taehyung, swimming over to tread water in front of him. “Don’t worry about me.”

“Oh.” Jungkook, looking around. He feels like he should leave—pulls the familiar tug up to the cabins where it’s safe and he can pretend that there’s nothing festering between him and Taehyung. Where he can pretend that he didn’t get drunk and confess that he loved him—to Lisa, but that’s details. 

But he’s trying, with Taehyung. So he stays. And Taehyung does too, treading water before at last clinging onto the dock in front of him, examining him. The moonlight, as always, makes him feel vulnerable. Exposed. Bare. Taehyung makes him feel this way, under the weight of his gaze. Like the stars and the moon and the sun are all scrutinizing him. Like the universe is looking down at him. 

It’s only natural. Taehyung was his universe for so long.

“You know, I really don’t understand you.” Taehyung props his chin up under his hands on the dock, looking up at him with wide eyes and Jungkook swears he can see the stars in them. “I saw the way you acted with Jiho. You’re clearly not an asshole.”

“Thanks,” Jungkook says, sitting down. He doesn’t know why he does that; he doesn’t know why he’s staying, he doesn’t know why he’s here. All he knows is that for the first time Taehyung isn’t staring at him with contempt, and that’s all he wants.

“Then why do you act like one?”

“I don’t act like an asshole.” 

“Maybe not to Lisa,” Taehyung says. “You know she’s dating someone, right?”

“Yeah,” says Jungkook. “Jisoo. They’re cute.”

“The way Yoongi talked about you, I thought you were like,” Taehyung pauses. “I don’t know. He talked about you like you were a fuckboy.”

Jungkook shrugs. 

“A straight fuckboy.”

A prickle of irritation runs up Jungkook’s neck. “Why is that so hard to believe?”

“I don’t know,” says Taehyung. “You tell me. ‘Cause the kid I used to be best friends with was scared of everyone.”

“So I’m not exactly a fuckboy,” says Jungkook. Taehyung locks eyes with him and he knows they’re both thinking about the other part of that sentence. “We’re not best friends anymore, anyway. People change.”

Taehyung’s eyes flash with hurt and Jungkook wants to make it better—he wants to make them better—but he doesn’t think that he knows how anymore. 

“I know that,” he says softly. “I just didn’t think that you would.”

He paddles off to the edge of the lake and Jungkook watches him; the smooth muscles of his back illuminated by the moon, staring up at the sky like he’s searching for answers. Jungkook watches him, and then he walks slowly up back towards the cabin. Taehyung’s eyes follow him the whole way, but he doesn’t notice; he’s too busy trying to figure out where the two boys from the lake all those years ago went. Trying to hope that they’re not gone forever. 

  
  
  
  


It starts with Lisa pounding on his door. At midnight. 

“I’m coming, I’m coming,” he says. He notices that Taehyung’s bed is empty—he’s been going swimming a lot lately. Mostly Jungkook thinks its just that he wants to be away from him. 

Lisa stands in the doorway, looking terrified.

“It’s Taehyung,” she says, and even though he’s trying so hard not to care Jungkook still feels himself shatter into pieces.

“What is it?” he asks. “Is he okay?”

“He was swimming and they think he had an asthma attack—they brought him into the dining hall.”

She leads him down the path and all Jungkook can think is that it can’t happen like this—he has his inhaler, he’ll be fine, but he can’t just—

She pushes the door open and Jungkook runs inside—only for her to close it on him. 

“Lisa?” he pounds on the door, but she twists the key in the lock. “What are you doing?”

He turns and sees Taehyung, very much not dying or having any health problems of any sort, sitting in a chair nervously and looking confused. He stands up when he sees Jungkook. 

“You didn’t pass out in the forest?”

“The fuck, no?” Jungkook stares at him. “You didn’t have an asthma attack?” 

“I told you it was better,” says Taehyung. “Why would you think that?”

“Lisa told me—” Jungkook spins to face the glass door, where Jimin has joined Lisa, the two of them staring solemnly. “You lied to us.”

“Yes, we did,” says Lisa. “But you two need to sort your shit out.”

“Lisa and I were talking,” says Jimin. “And we’ve decided that your emotional drama is too much for us to handle.”

“I have a cabin full of pre-pubescent girls,” says Lisa. “They are less stressful than you two are.”

“So you can come out when the kitchen staff comes in,” says Jimin. “At—” he checks his watch “—six in the morning.”

“Until then, you two are going to sort your shit out,” says Lisa. “And I have the only key, so don’t even try.” She tosses it to Jimin, who twirls it around his finger. 

“Also, we stole your phones,” says Jimin, holding up what Jungkook recognizes to be his and Taehyung’s phones. 

“Hey!” Taehyung yelps.

“You’ll get them back when you start talking,” says Lisa. And with that, they both spin on their heels and walk off through the night, Lisa’s hair swinging behind her in a long curtain, Jimin still twirling the keys. 

Jungkook glances at Taehyung and sinks into a chair. “No,” he says.

“No, what?”

“I don’t fucking know,” he says. “They woke me up and dragged me down here and I find out they lied to me.” He shakes his head. 

“They lied to me too,” says Taehyung.

“Well, then we should lie to them,” says Jungkook. “We can just say that we talked and that we’re good and we can go back to our usual thing.”

“Our usual thing of ignoring and snapping at each other?”

“You were the one who started the snapping thing,” says Jungkook, perhapso more bitingly than he needs to. 

“Well, you’re the one who literally ran away from me when I tried to talk to you,” says Taehyung. Jungkook shrugs. 

“I freaked,” he says. 

“You know,” says Taehyung. “For someone who just left me out of _nowhere_ you’re a lot less confident about it than you should be.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” says Jungkook.

Taehyung takes something out of his pocket and starts fiddling with it. “You ignored me,” he says quietly. “Blocked me after my birthday. You know I was planning to come out to my entire family that day?” He shakes his head. “I wanted you there. I needed my best friend there.”

“Oh,” says Jungkook. “I’m sorry.” He pauses. “But you have a new best friend now.” He tries to keep the bitterness out of his voice. 

Taehyung looks at him sadly. “Jimin’s amazing and supportive and sweet,” he says. “But he’s not you. I don’t feel about him the way that I . . . the way that we were.”

Jungkook shakes his head, trying not to dwell on the implications of that. “So where are you going to college?”

“I texted you that,” says Taehyung. “I’m in your city.” He gives the name of the university and Jungkook sits up.

“That’s where I go,” he says. 

“Oh,” says Taehyung. 

“I thought I saw you a couple times,” says Jungkook. “But I couldn’t be sure.”

“Me too,” says Taehyung. He shakes his head. “You know I texted you. A lot.”

“I didn’t see,” says Jungkook, ducking his head. 

“Because you blocked me,” says Taehyung. “Why did you do that? I’m trying to figure it out and I still can’t.”

Jungkook stares at his hands. He wants to tell him, but he doesn’t. He’s scared. Two years later and still too scared to tell his friend how he felt. Feels. 

“Was it because I kissed you?”

“I kissed you first,” says Jungkook quietly. 

“Then why?” Taehyung asks. 

Jungkook stares at his hands.

“Whatever.” Taehyung stands up and walks over to the door and crouches down next to it, fiddling with the lock. “Should’ve known better than to think that you’d want to talk about it.”

“What are you doing?”

There’s a click and Taehyung stands up. “Credit card,” he says, holding it up. “Lucky I had my wallet on me.” 

He swings the door open and looks back at Jungkook. “I’m gonna go,” he says quietly, and then he’s walking away, his back illuminated by the stars and faint glow of the moon and Jungkook wants him, wants him back and in that moment he can feel him slipping through his fingers and he knows that if he lets him go now he’ll never get him back. 

“Wait!”

Taehyung turns around and looks at him. Jungkook is sprinting after him, grabbing onto his hand. The touch of his skin after so many years is like electricity. Taehyung is still warm, even if he’s being deliberately cool towards Jungkook now.

“You still owe me a life-debt.”

Taehyung tilts his head. “What?”

“You owe me a life-debt,” says Jungkook. “And we’re not best friends anymore, so I want something else.”

Taehyung jerks his hand away and crosses his arms. “And what is that?”

Jungkook tightens his jaw. “You have to come down to the lake with me. One last time.”

Taehyung looks at him strangely, then follows after him. “Fine,” he says. Jungkook stalks down to the lake, not even looking at Taehyung, his heart pounding so loud that Taehyung must be able to hear it. 

Jungkook doesn’t know what he’s doing. He doesn’t know what he’s doing until he stalks out onto the dock, stopping at the end. 

“Do you remember?” he asks. 

“Remember what?” Taehyung waits on the edge of the dock, keeping his distance from Jungkook. 

“That night,” says Jungkook. “Romeo and Juliet. I—you—we kissed.”

“Of course I remember,” says Taehyung. “What’s this about?”

“Did it mean anything to you?” asks Jungkook. 

“Shouldn’t I be asking you that?” Taehyung asks. “You’re the one who’s a serial dater according to Yoongi.”

“You talked to—” Jungkook stops. “They didn’t mean anything.”  _ You meant everything.  _ “I asked you first.”

“You answer,” says Taehyung. “I’m here already, you have to answer first.”

“It meant—” Jungkook looks at him and swears the stars are laughing at him above. Laughing at him because he still wants to be the boy who kissed his best friend, so afraid, and was kissed back. “You were my best friend, Tae. It meant the world to me.  _ You _ meant the world to me.”

“Tae,” says Taehyung, looking down. “You called me Tae.”

“Sorry.”

“No,” says Taehyung. “I was just surprised—” He stops. “Then why did you leave?”

“I—” Jungkook sighs. Now or never. “I saw you kissing Minjae.”

Taehyung’s face changes. “Oh,” he says. “Oh, Kookie.” 

_ Kookie.  _ Jungkook looks up hopefully, but Taehyung looks like he’s made a mistake. 

“I guess I thought that I meant something to you and when I saw you—I thought that I was special and that was dumb but I still should’ve been with you because you were my best friend,” Jungkook says. “I loved you but I left you because I was stupid and young and hurt. I shouldn’t have left you because of that. I’m sorry.”

“You loved me?” asks Taehyung. 

“Sorry it’s dumb,” says Jungkook, ducking his head. 

“I loved you,” says Taehyung. 

“What?”

“You were my best friend,” says Taehyung. “You meant  _ everything _ —”

“Then  _ why?”  _ Jungkook asks, tears brimming in his eyes. “Why? That  _ hurt,  _ it hurt so much to see you—”

“I didn’t kiss him, Kookie,” says Taehyung. 

“What?” 

Taehyung steps forward. “I didn’t kiss him. He kissed me. I didn’t kiss him back.” He touches Jungkook’s face. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”   
“I was the one who hurt you—” Jungkook’s head is spinning. Taehyung didn’t kiss Minjae. Taehyung didn’t kiss Minjae. 

So what does that mean for him? For  _ them?  _

“Do you think you could again?” Taehyung asks. 

“What do you mean?”   
Taehyung steps closer and Jungkook can feel his breath, see the stars in his eyes. “Do you think you could love me again? Ever?”

“Could you?” Jungkook asks softly. 

“Sometimes I think I still do,” says Taehyung, and Jungkook kisses him.

He’s afraid that he’s done something wrong when he pulls back—have they grown too far apart for Taehyung to love him again? For them to be the same as they were? But then Taehyung just smiles at him. 

“Can I take that as a yes?” he asks softly, and Jungkook nods against his forehead. 

“Good,” Taehyung says, slipping his hands around his neck. “‘Cause I’ve missed you.”   
“Missed you too,” says Jungkook, and Taehyung kisses him again and he slips a hand underneath his cheek, feeling tears drop down across his fingers. “Are you okay?”

“I’m happy,” says Taehyung. “And sad, I guess.”   
“I was stupid,” says Jungkook. “I was so, so stupid. I’m sorry, I’m so, so sorry—”

“Jungkook?” asks Taehyung. Jungkook looks at him. “Do you want to catch fireflies with me?”

Jungkook grins at him and kisses the tip of his nose. “I’d love to.”  
  
  


☼☼☼

A lovely day! Yet many such,

Each like to each, this month have passed,

And none did so supremely shine.

One thing they lacked: the perfect touch

Of thee—and thou art come at last,

And half this loveliness is thine. 

Robert Fuller Murray

☼☼☼  
  


For Jungkook, his universe is predicated on two universal truths, so assured, Taehyung tells him, that even if the sun never rose over the lake in the morning and the breakfast food in the canteen ceases to be fucking terrible, that they would remain the same.

The first is that he’s in love with his best friend; he’s in love with the way the sun rises over them in the morning, in love with deep laughs and wide smiles and freckles that dot his face like stars in a summer sky, in love with conversations that lead to nowhere and the comfort of a hand in his and a warm body that he can always fall back on. He’s in love with his best friend and he’s memorized the moles on his face and every scar and dot and crevice in his skin like he’s memorized the paths in the woods in camp, like he’s memorized the water currents and the species of fish and trees and where the poison ivy is and where it isn’t.

The second, though he still finds it to believe sometimes (so Taehyung whispers it to him every morning, every night, swears that he would scream it off the tops of the mountains if Jungkook would let him) is that Taehyng loves him back.

**Author's Note:**

> this is the first time i've written like a one-shot i hope you enjoyed it! 
> 
> also yes there was very little lisoo in there which is why I'm writing a sequel bc i had a hard time finding kpop related f/f on ao3 and it makes me sad if anyone has any recs
> 
> poems are not mine they all come from [this](https://www.poemhunter.com/) site
> 
> kudos and comments keep my alive!! thanks for reading sm!!


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